Compensation for Bandwidth Costs is Extortion?

Tha_Big_Guy23 asks: "According to this article, a man who created a website for his local Sheriff's department is being charged with extortion. This was caused by taking down the website after repeated attempts to get compensation from the county to cover the bandwidth costs. As a result, all his personal computer property, and company computer property was seized and he was jailed."

"After being jailed he was charged with extortion, larceny by conversion, using a computer to commit a crime, and obstruction of justice. This website explains in more detail the circumstances surrounding the situation. Has anyone on Slashdot ever had an experience where a client was unwilling to compensate you for either your work, and/or the resources required to do your work?"

While the end result of this situation is a shame, let this situation serve as a warning for those of you who work, without a contract in place. While it is the general hope that people will behave in an honorable manner, sometimes this is just not the case, and contracts exist to protect both parties, when things go sour.

Oh, gotta rant, gotta rant on this one...

This guy gives website designers a bad name. I'd say he definitely belongs in prison. 3.5 million hits per month? Oh, yeah, right. I get the feeling that this guy was planning to pull this stunt all along, but I bet he wasn't counting on getting arrested. Another clue is the fact that he set the domain name up as his own property so the town would be unable to switch to another server. What a noble thing to do. And then there's his final bill... $300,000?! To offset the "huge expense" of running the website? WHAT huge expense? How much was he paying for hosting? DIdn't want to lose any more money? Why didn't he just set it up on a different server and let the town pay for it themselves? I think this guy wants to the town to pay for the loss he's taken running his business in the first place, and shutting the server down while handing over such a massive bill is, IMHO, extortion, and should be treated as such. I hope they throw the book at him, and throw it at him hard, to serve as a warning to anyone else thinking of pulling a stunt like this. Whew, I'm outta breath. Gotta go lay down for a minute.

Thankyou sir

My knee was jerking furiously until I read your excellent post. I can rest easy now knowing that there's two sides to this story and we have another sensationalized /. article.

Re:Thankyou sir

And another highly misleading headline. "Compensation for Bandwidth Costs is Extortion?" is a real twisting of the reported facts, even if the webguy's claims are reasonable (They aren't). His actions certainly are not reasonable.

Re:Thankyou sir

The way I see it, Slashdot is providing is readers with valuable lessons in critical thinking. At what other news site could you exercise your mind to read between the lines, besides Slashdot?

Re:Thankyou sir

At what other news site could you exercise your mind to read between the lines, besides Slashdot?

Fox ?

Re:Thankyou sir

You're not real familiar with North American "news" sources, are you? If they're not sensationalizing completely baseless conclusions drawn from inconclusive scientific reports ("the gay gene has been discovered!") they're just making shit it up and hoping nobody notices (NYTimes, anybody?).

I guess it was inevitable. Once slashdot got big enough and had a clearly defined set of agendas within the readership, sensationalizing headlines and distorting the actual news reports to play on the mores and taboos of the group became a good way to get eyes on stories and, in turn, a good way to get more hits for squeezing advertiser wallets.

Re:Thankyou sir

This is why Slashdot is relatively good journalism, IMO. Even when the submitters and editors are clearly biased, it is only a few comments into the following discussion that things get balanced out. How often do we see on the big cable and broadcast networks retractions and alternatives being shown within minutes? Almost never.

Even for the frequent story about Microsoft or SCO, there'll be at least a few comments among the flames adjusting the facts of the story. Actually, by being so harsh on these companies, for example, we can help the public better understand what is true and what is misrepresented regarding their actions. Hold the feet to the fire, so to speak.

Re:Thankyou sir

True, true...I frequently play devil's advocate and point out the unpopular counter to the "slashdot" view. And I'm surprised how often I get scores like "50% Insightful, 50% Overrated," due to some Slashdotters trying to suppress facts while others are trying to underscore counterarguments.

End result? More information from more points of view, and that's better for everybody.

Re:What exactly is Slashdot?

Wait a second. Slashdot is journalism?

I've been reading ./ for years now, and I always thought that it was a BBS that was extremely popular because it linked to lots of news stories, which gave its members a constant stream of new topics to "discuss".

Slashdot is what happens after journalism.

Re:Thankyou sir

I know Slashdot has never been a place you trust unquestioningly for your news, not that trusting any source unquestionably is a good idea, but is it just me or have the editor's knees been getting a much better workout over the past couple of months?

Based on my understandings of the problem, just looking at the current YRO frontpage [slashdot.org], two of the last four stories have blurbs that are just plain wrong ("Courts Overturn FCC - Return of the Monopoly?", "Do You Have A License For Those Facts?" (my debunking [jerf.org] and I'm a certified IP wonk). One of the others ("MSN Search Blocking Results For XFree86?") didn't really have enough data to prove or disprove (so it's probably not worth the 868 comments it attracted).

Now this article, where I think the blurb is deceptive enough to constitute being "wrong".

Slashdot editors, you are getting sloppy and going from moderate benefit (at least it provided some reasonably centralized source of information) to positive menace. Please, either spend more time digging into these stories, or stop posting the blurbs. You can disclaim responsibility for the accuracy of the stories until you're blue in the face, but the fact is that posting does constitute some degree of approval, since there is a selection process.

This is an intervention. Please stop damaging our cause. You're marginalizing all of us who are legitimately concerned about the way things are going when you post so much obviously wrong stuff under the guise of "being on our side".

(At least do us the courtesy of starting to shill for the RIAA and MPAA if you don't want to be bothered with improving your accuracy.)

Re:Thankyou sir

One of the others ("MSN Search Blocking Results For XFree86?") didn't really have enough data to prove or disprove (so it's probably not worth the 868 comments it attracted).

What are you talking about? if you either click on the link in the story, or go to msn.com, type "xfree86" in the box at the top, then click on search, you only get 1 result, which is porn and it warns you about.

If you go to any other search engine there is more than one result and it isnt this nightcrawler business. google has 2.4 million.

tellingly if you search on google for xfree86 nightsurf, you only get 28 results, none of which is the website that msn throws up.

Re:Thankyou sir

And what have we learned today, children?

Do not attempt to scam people who have the power to throw you in jail. The elderly are a much better target.

Thank you and goodnight.

-B

Re:Thankyou sir

Noo....
What we have learned is, when you are setting up a sweetheart deal with the local sheriff's office, and you bill them an outrageous amount, pocket half and give the other half to the sheriff, make sure you have some sort of evidence on hand to use against the sheriff if people start noticing, so you can say "he made me do it! ".

Good Old Boy Politics 101, learned in CLarksville, TN "The Crime and Corruption capital of Tennessee".

Re:Thankyou sir

His actions certainly are not reasonable.

They didn't pay, he shut down the site. Explain the part of that you consider "unreasonable", please?

Whether or not you consider the magnitude of his bill to the county as reasonable, it boils down simply to "he provided a service, sent a bill, bill went unpaid, he stopped providing the service". Nothing more than that.

Theft of service also breaks the law. Key difference, a private individual doesn't have the power to abuse to have people from the country government frivolously arrested.


Also, RTFA (in particular, the second link). He did not send them a bill for $300k... He said his total expenses came out to $300k (not unreasonable, if he actually worked something resembling full-time for 2-3 years... That alone gives $200k+ depending on the going rate in his area for a network admin). He didn't even attempt to recover any of his past expenses on the project. He merely requested they start paying for his services, and when they refused, he stopped providing the service.

If this counts as extortion, it sets a VERY dangerous precedent... A precedent that basically makes slavery legal, by making it a crime to stop performing a voluntary service.

On the bright side, assuming he doesn't end up in prison for a few years, he has a fairly good case for harassment, with monetary damages resulting. He could end up getting considerably more than his $300k (which, again, he did not actually try to bill the county for).

Re:Thankyou sir

Richard, a former reserve deputy in the sheriff's marine division, more than three years ago offered to provide the Web site at no cost to the county as an in-kind contribution. Hackel, who enthusiastically supported it, said Richard agreed to operate it in exchange for publicity for his company.

He agreed to host it at no cost. If he waited 2-3 years before asking them to pay, then he is only owed from the point he asked to when he stopped hosting the site. He truly was a fool though to run the site for that long if he expected payment from the beginning. Of course the second link states he tried getting paid during this period of time. Someone isn't telling the truth. So unless the guy has proof he tried to obtain payment on certain dates, he's not going to win.

Re:Thankyou sir

Someone isn't telling the truth.

I agree, and didn't mean to imply that he necessarily went about this with the best of intentions (not many people would blow $300k of their own money purely for the benefit of the county government).

But, I can't see any way that the this can count as outright extortion. Even if he did it for publicity or other non-monetary considerations, without a contract (which both articles make clear as one of the big problems in this situation), he has no obligation to continue providing the service.

So does the county "owe" him any money? I'd say morally yes, but legally no. But does he need to keep providing the service if they don't pay? Again, no. Not extortion, just basic capitalism. If I stop paying my cable, and my cable company shuts me off for not paying, I'd get laughed out of court if I cried "extortion!". Even lacking a contract (let's say I found the cable live when I moved in, and just started using it), I would get charged with theft of services when the CC noticed, not the other way around.

Re:Thankyou sir

Well the way I read it he didn't 'blow $300k of his own money.' The $300k was in "time, money, and resources". Thus I have a strong feeling that of that $9,000 per month, every month for 33 in a row he is claiming to have spent to total the $300k, a pretty good chunk of it was his self-assigned pay rate of $150 an hour (my guess, no basis in fact) for his own time 'webmastering'.

Did he actually write checks for $9,000 per month is true expenses? Electricity, new hardware, bandwidth charges from his upstream provider? I'm guessing no fscking way.

And according to the first article, yes he did plonk down a bill, a piece of paper saying something to the effect of 'you owe me $300,000'. They told him to get bent, then arrested him.

That said, I think this entire thing is stupid. No farm-team sheriff office needs a web site that has 3.5 million 'hits' a month from 60 countries. And for damn sure no farm-team sheriff office web site is worth $300,000 over three years, traffic or no traffic. Someone is about to earn a few whacks from the clue stick.

Re:Thankyou sir

Good response. Gotta love people that actually read an article and get it all wrong.

The thing is, if this was any other business besides a government one (more specifically a police one), they would have to sue him like anyone else, not immediately seize all his gear. This is the problem with cops in general, they have the power to act and ruin your life, and ask questions later.

I don't care if this guy DID try to inflate the prices and such, I do not feel as though the police should have the right to do this to him without a court order.

Re:Thankyou sir

If I volunteer to do work for you for free, and then send you a bill for it, that is fraud and/or extortion.

Fraud, maybe. But if I volunteer to do work for you for free, and then later tell you I'm not gonna work for you any more unless you pay me, that's just the breaks. If you don't like it, you don't use my services any more. It wasn't extortion when X-Drive said they weren't gonna be free anymore, and I'd have to pay them if I didn't want them to dump my files. It's not extortion when eFax tells me that I'm gonna have to pay them if I want to keep the fax number they've provided for years for free. How is this different?

If the sheriff wanted a SLA guarantee, he would have hired a commercial service. He got what he paid for. And if the sheriff wanted to own the domain, he should have gotten a .gov domain, unless he's selling justice he's got no business with a .com TLD anyhow.

[Insert ignorant redneck sheriff joke here]

Re:Thankyou sir

If I volunteer to do work for you for free, and then send you a bill for it, that is fraud and/or extortion.

It's certainly not extortion. It may be fraud. Depends on the nature of the bill, and the nature of the agreement. If there is a dispute abut the nature of the agreement, (abnd it appears that there is) then it is a civil matter. Not a criminal matter.

The first link (which goes to a somewhat unbiased newspaper) clearly says he asked for $300K.

Don't trust the media to get all the facts right. they tend to make small mistakes, and mishear things, and write what they think happened rather than what actually happened.

Re:Thankyou sir

The guy volunteered to host and maintain the site in exchange for free publicity. Then he decided to stop doing so. But instead of handing the site and the domain over to the police department, he decided to try to shake money out of them. That certainly sounds believable, and the department's reaction is quite understandable.

I see. So if I do volunteer work for another entity without any sort of contract, with the clear disclaimer on all the work that I own it, and then I decide to stop doing it, I have to turn over my work for free or be thrown in jail?

Who "owns" a domain name? In this case, he offered to set up the site for publicity. He registered the domain name, the site always said that it was owned by his company, and then he stopped providing the free service (after a year of trying to negotiate a new deal where they would pay him for it). The domain name and the data has value to the sherriff's department (obviously), and they have NO AGREEMENT that he is to turn over the data or domain name to them if he stops hosting the site. So of course, it's perfectly understandable that they would throw him in jail and confiscate his equipment if he wanted them to pay for it.

He might have asked for an unreasonable amount, and he might have even felt a bit malicious about it. Certainly, he had them up a tree, but they did do a lot of the climbing themselves. Still doesn't seem to me to be that obvious that he committed any crime.

Re:Thankyou sir

He forgot the 285th rule of acquisition: "No good deed goes unpunished."

uh, whatever!

They guy was frikkin arrested, his equipment impounded, and he's being threatened with 20 years in jail. For a dispute that should be settled in civil court. Is the guy snow white innocent in the whole affair? Probably not. Is the police department committing a huge abuse of authority? Hell yes!

Re:Oh, gotta rant, gotta rant on this one...

Before everyone gets their tin foil in a not, a few quotes from the article to show that there are two sides to every story:

Richard then demanded $300,000 of taxpayer dollars from the county. Richard said the money would offset the huge expense of running the Web site for the 33 months.

This for 3.5 million users per year.

Richard lied to investigators by claiming he sold the domain name to a Virginia company, Hackel said. Hackel said his mistake was placing too much trust in Richard and agreeing to have Richard pay the nominal domain fee. Richard retains authority of the domain name.

Appearently he was holding the domain name until they paid him $300,000

Re:Oh, gotta rant, gotta rant on this one...

If he could prove his costs were $9090.90 per month in bandwidth fees, then he has a valid argument bottom line. I have a customer who happens to be a Sgt of the police department where i work, and the guy is a total prick. I'm not saying this as antipolice, I mean it the guy is an asshole. He uses a DS3 and whenever there is a problem with Verizon, he tries to ream anyone in the company to the point of workers feeling threatened. Even knowing VZ is the reason to blame, he still insists on DAMNIT I want my line on now! and mysteriously workers' cars fall victims to tickets for shit we never even knew existed. "Ticketed for degraded Windshield wiper" Hell I would fight too if I can prove it cost me 300k in fees in bandwidth.

Re:Oh, gotta rant, gotta rant on this one...

Or better yet, talk to your local press (if you have a local press, and if you don't, you should start one, it isn't hard and can be quite lucrative). The whole reason for freedom of the press was to prevent totalitarianism in local justice.

Example: one of my local PDs was notoriously full of money grubbing racist assholes. Our local paper started trolling through records and LO AND BEHOLD, discovered a number of major improprieties, including overtime pay when people were obviously elsewhere and sexual assault cases against various high ranking officers that had "stalled" in court. Paper started publishing on them, and the guilty officers started disappearing from the force. The remaining guys are sweet as can be, because they know that fucking around with the gray areas will get them canned with no pension.

Re:Oh, gotta rant, gotta rant on this one...

This for 3.5 million users per year.

Actually, that's 3.5 million users per month...

42 million per year

115.5 million for the lifetime of the site

Re:Oh, gotta rant, gotta rant on this one...

Macomb county is not some podunk area, it is part of metro Detroit

The domain is registered to someone in Virginia

The domain is in fact registered to someone in Virginia. But note the phony phone number.

• Registrant:
• 
  Fountainhead Media (MACOMBSHERIFF-DOM)
  19950 Denby
  Portsmouth, VA 23708
  US
  
  Domain Name: MACOMBSHERIFF.COM
  
  Administrative Contact, Technical Contact:
  Stanley, Michael (36687838P)
  [e-mail]
  Fountainhead Media
  19950 Denby
  Portsmouth, VA 23708
  US
  999-999-9999
  

Re:The domain is registered to someone in Virginia

Ah, yes. [e-mail]. Nothing like a hotmail.com address to inspire confidence in your professionalism or legitimacy. Throw in "_463" at the end there is no doubt whatsoever.

Re:Oh, gotta rant, gotta rant on this one...

My guess is that his lawyer posted this article in order to "slashdot" the new domain - in a tactic to drive up their bandwidth costs to make the $300,000 seem a little more reasonable.

Re:Oh, gotta rant, gotta rant on this one...

3.5 million hits per month

"hits" is such a crappy way to measure bandwidth. Depending on how the site is built and which web traffic monitoring tool you use, a single unique visit to a site can result in hundreds of hits. My shitty site gets in the order of 50-70k hits a month and I know its only my mom.

Re:Oh, gotta rant, gotta rant on this one...

"My shitty site gets in the order of 50-70k hits a month and I know its only my mom."

Should've posted the URL here, dude.

Re:Oh, gotta rant, gotta rant on this one...

old sites are available on the wayback machine [archive.org].

Re:Oh, gotta rant, gotta rant on this one...

Damned it - preview/submit - who knows

So the police dept. unwisely used a free service. At this point - make contracts that guarantee that the site is up and useful.

Where it is nice to get things started on a shoestring, at some point SOMEONE should have thought "Hmmmm... We are spending real dollars here to advertise this site - we should spend the dollars now to make sure that we can have access to this site at all times"

No no no no no.

Wait, please RTFA. He OFFERED to run the site for free initially, I quote:

Richard, a former reserve deputy in the sheriff's marine division, more than three years ago offered to provide the Web site at no cost to the county as an in-kind contribution. Hackel, who enthusiastically supported it, said Richard agreed to operate it in exchange for publicity for his company.

Doesn't sound like he was getting screwed to me. Sounds like he pulled a turnaround when he asked the county for $300,000 all of a sudden.

I've actually been in a situation when we've had to shut someone's site down because they wouldn't pay. It took us more than 6 months to do it though, because we were professional and considerate, and it wasn't even a big site, just one of our small clients. But we had to do it after a while because he was just totally ignoring our bills and communications. He did eventually pay a reduced sum that we agreed to through negotiations. We then surrendered his domain gladly. But my point is, we gave him a long time and we tried really hard to communicate with him before shutting him down. It was the most drastic thing I've EVER done to a client, and I still feel a little weird about it.

This sounds different. Sounds like ye old bait and switch to me. And it doesn't really sound like they were out of communication--something I'm sure should have been worked out before the drastic step of shutting down their site happened. ESPECIALLY considering this guy offered to do it for free initially. You don't just shut down someone's site, especially not a high profile client like this. You just don't. There are other avenues way before that happens.

Re:Oh, gotta rant, gotta rant on this one...

Nope... he was operating on the "free drugs" model of business...

Give the county free services for three years, then hit them with the price and tell them that they can't live without him... that's not true, the county can take those three years of free service and give him nothing but a thank you, and then take their business elsewhere.

While the extortion charge is a bit extreme, he's lost all hope of doing business with any local government in the area ever again. He should know that local governments have to follow strict purchasing rules, and usually any contract worth $300,000 a year has to go out to bid.

His claim of ownership of the domain is a bit weak. He's not the Macomb Sheriff. The sheriff's office could very well create a trademark and then sue for posession of the domain name.

Re:Oh, gotta rant, gotta rant on this one...

Read TFA, not skim TFA.

According to the second link in the article, he spent $300,000 of his own money and is not asking for his inventment back. He simply tried to tell the county that, going forward, he couldn't afford to pay for it himself. When they ignored him, he closed up shop to keep from losing more money. They retaliated by arresting him and slapping him with exortion and other charges.

Re:Oh, gotta rant, gotta rant on this one...

I read both articles, and they contratict each other.. The news article says he demanded $300,000... The other site says that he didn't want that money back. Who do we believe?

Re:Oh, gotta rant, gotta rant on this one...

For two years, Pat attempted to negotiate a way to pay for the site. For two years, Pat worked without pay. For two years, RunningWolf was not compensated for its server space or its bandwidth costs. For two years Pat spent $300,000 of his own money to host and maintain the site, never asking for nor receiving a profit.

Pat did not ask for payment of any of that investment, but simply explained to the county he could no longer afford to host and maintain the site for free. For 2 years the sheriff refused to negotiate a way to continue paying for the site.

Considering that it is undisputed that this guy donated nearly 3 years of his time to this county before asking for anything, I find it much more likely that his side of the story is more accurate. You don't see greedy/selfish people work selflessly for 3 years with no return on investment.

You do however, see greedy/selfish people willingly leach off of generous people for years, and then sue or otherwise take legal action when those generous people stop.

You seem to be very ready to believe that a guy would be willing to work for you pro bono for 3 years, then suddenly turn and try to extort you by withholding his free service? How am I the one with the tin-foil hat? I have more faith in people than that.