The curious case of Francis Rawls.

[Jehanne]

You can just Google his name (or, read the link below); he has been in jail now for 18 months, accused of having child porn on his computer, a portion of which has been encrypted.  He says that he cannot remember his password but the judge says that he can remember but is just not revealing it, and so, he is in jail, for life:

http://wtop.com/government/2017/03/jaile...passwords/

But, here's my problem with it all.  Let's say that you don't like someone.  (Not anyone on this forum, of course, would ever do this!)  And, so, "you" decide to get even by downloading child pornography off of the DeepWeb.  You create an encrypted volume on your enemies computer, whether on an internal hard-drive or an external one, with a long and gibberish passphrase, copying, of course, all of the child porn on to that drive/container.  And, then, you go to the cops and say that "so and so" is looking at child porn, which they even showed to you!

And, "Voilà!"  Your enemy is now in jail for life for having "refused" to disclose a password that they do not know and which they could not ever guess over the lifetime of the Universe!  Sound sweet?!  To me, it sounds absolutely disgusting, but I betcha it will happen here someday soon, if not already!

So, what do you think?  Is the US judiciary out of control for having jailed someone for life who has not even been charged with a crime??  It seems to me that there needs to be some legal reform in this area.

[Minimalist]

The justice system is out of control for many reasons.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Yeah, there definitely needs to be a reviews process for contempt charges.

[CapnAwesome]

Framing someone seems pretty easy for that and lots of stuff. Nobody ever gets acquittal on being framed.

[Edwardo Piet]

Anyone else think Benjamin Button?

[brewer]

From the article it appears that they have enough for a conviction without seeing the encrypted files. They know that he down loaded child porn, that should be enough(Quote: police already had forensic evidence that Rawls had child pornography stored on his computer hard drive, including a relative’s statement and electronic fingerprints showing he had downloaded it.). They don't need to see the physical files. (not a lawyer, don't hold me to that)

Rawls should be allowed to claim 5th amendment self incrimination rights. This is no different than a person not disclosing where the body is. 

I looked at the average amount of jail time for child porn possession cases, 18 months appears to be a drop in the bucket. (google it yourself)

I say get on with the case and if (more like when) convicted that will be considered time served. I doubt he'll be jailed for life. That kind of talk is just drama, drama, drama.

Edit: Not even going to discuss framing. What if's are not very productive.

[Autumnlicious]

If they have enough to convict, then what are they waiting for?

[Mr Greene]

And they can't just brute force hack it?

[Jehanne]

And they can't just brute force hack it?

The energy requirements to do that might exceed all of the known energy in the Universe:

http://www.muppetlabs.com/~breadbox/txt/rsa.html

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If they have enough to convict, then what are they waiting for?

Agreed.  If they have enough evidence to keep him in jail, then he at least deserves a trial.  I think that it was Thomas Jefferson who said that, "99 guilty should go free before an innocent man is convicted."

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From the article it appears that they have enough for a conviction without seeing the encrypted files. They know that he down loaded child porn, that should be enough(Quote: police already had forensic evidence that Rawls had child pornography stored on his computer hard drive, including a relative’s statement and electronic fingerprints showing he had downloaded it.). They don't need to see the physical files. (not a lawyer, don't hold me to that)

Rawls should be allowed to claim 5th amendment self incrimination rights. This is no different than a person not disclosing where the body is. 

I looked at the average amount of jail time for child porn possession cases, 18 months appears to be a drop in the bucket. (google it yourself)

I say get on with the case and if (more like when) convicted that will be considered time served. I doubt he'll be jailed for life. That kind of talk is just drama, drama, drama.

Edit: Not even going to discuss framing. What if's are not very productive.

He is probably guilty; however, is it a "beyond-a-reasonable" doubt guilt?  Of course, someone (say, his "vengeful" sister) could have set him up, downloading the porn while she (or, for that matter, someone else) had access to his computer.

By the way, I work in IT (over 20 years), and gaining access to someone's computer is trivially easy.  Getting by a Window's password is a piece of cake, hardly any trouble at all.  All that one has to do is to pull the hard drive, and from there, you can install whatever legitimate software that you want to gain access.  In fact, hacking someone's router is just as easy, as most people choose really shitty passwords, which can be cracked via offline attacks -- capture the encrypted cipher and then bust it.

[Thumpalumpacus]

[...] and electronic fingerprints showing he had downloaded it.)[...]

Do you have a source showing that he downloaded it? Can you exclude the possibility that someone used his computer, either directly or by mimicking its signature online?

I'm not much informed on how these sorts of claims are evidenced.