“The great iPhone prototype caper of 2010 has finally ended, with the two men accused of shopping the device to gadget blogs sentenced to probation yesterday,” Greg Sandoval and Declan McCullagh report for CNET.
See: iPhone theft suspects get probation, public service, each pay have to pay Apple $250 in restitution – October 12, 2011
“Last year’s investigation began with a raid on Gizmodo editor Jason Chen’s Fremont, Calif., home, followed by a painstaking examination of Chen’s electronic files. Investigators suggested at the time that Chen could face criminal charges, and he soon hired a criminal defense attorney,” Sandoval and McCullagh report. “But San Mateo County District Attorney Steven Wagstaffe told CNET yesterday that there was not enough evidence to indict Chen or anyone else affiliated with Gizmodo.”
Sandoval and McCullagh report, “Wagstaffe said, however, that his office’s review of the computers seized from Chen’s home showed the correspondence between Gizmodo editors was ‘juvenile.’ ‘It was obvious that they were angry with the company about not being invited to some press conference or some big Apple event. We expected to see a certain amount of professionalism — this is like 15-year-old children talking,’ Wagstaffe said. ‘There was so much animosity, and they were very critical of Apple. They talked about having Apple right where they wanted them and they were really going to show them.'”
Sandoval and McCullagh report, “‘If I were prosecuting, I’d go after [any blogger who bought the phone] vigorously,’ Michael Cardoza, a prominent San Francisco defense attorney and former prosecutor, said last year. ‘I’d fight them tooth and nail to see that they wouldn’t get protection under the shield law. I’d play hardball in this case. They didn’t find the phone as part of their reporting but instead bought property that they knew or should have known wasn’t the property of the seller.'”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Like slimy worms, off the hook they slither.
Related articles:
Former Gizmodo editor Brian Lam apologizes for iPhone 4 prototype imbroglio – October 6, 2011
Apple may pursue a civil suit against Gawker Media over iPhone 4 prototype leak – August 22, 2011
Gizmodo gets off the hook in prototype iPhone 4 imbroglio; men who sold it charged – August 10, 2011
To think that juvenile Chen convinced himself that Steve forgave him without hard proof/evidence. Another sign of juvenile, immature, childish you name it, mindset.
Hey, don’t be so hard on Chen! If you read is “apology,” you’ll see that he sincerely wishes he could have done everything exactly the way he did it, making no actual changes whatsoever, and still have had Steve like him.
Wait, what?
Heheheh!
LOL…
He wishes one thing they would make differently: not to press Apple issue legal claim for the phone.
This resulted some problems for both Lam and Chen (the former was fired and the latter got the police search and nerve-wrecking period not knowing whether he will be indicted or not), though none of them were jailed, unfortunately.
If they would make Apple go legal way (Apple made legal claims to police and prosecution about this), this story would be much less issue.
So basically with the “apology” Lam said that he would like to Steven still talking good with him and less troubles, while doing the same crime exactly the same way.
Chen and his editor, Lam.
The prosecution was a coward here: instead of protecting the law, they sided with they buyers of stolen property, being afraid of media backlash on “oppression of free press” or some other fake excuse to commit crimes.
Chen Lam Scum
As long as Apple keeps them on the “no fly” event list. Being assholes should be it’s own reward. (I know, it often is!)
Rumor has it, prior to any Apple media event in Cupertino, Gizmodo’s name will be placed above a designated stall in the men’s room adjacent to the conference center. 🙂
They escaped indictment because the San Mateo County DA didn’t have the nutsack to tackle the inevitable “are bloggers journalists?” Issue. They had plenty of evidence.
My favorite part was the defense attorney from San Francisco telling people how badassed he’d be if it were his case.
And thanks to the spinelessness of the San Mateo County DA, a precedent has now been set, inviting an open season on stolen prototypes. One would hope other publications would hold on to *some* integrity, and not stoop to Gizmodo’s level, but I wouldn’t hold out too much hope for that in today’s world. Look for more instances of this happening, with the “journalists” in question hiding behind shield laws as an excuse to commit criminal acts.
Who the f*** cares. It’s only a freaking iPhone, not like it’s something important. Jesus, people get a goddamn grip.
If you were running a company with a hotly anticipated product, and had a prototype stolen and its details leaked before launch (giving competitors more time to react to what you’re doing), how would you feel then?
And how would your company’s shareholders feel if you just sat back and didn’t do anything about it?
And that’s not even getting into all of the issues surrounding shield laws, free speech and the question of who today is a “journalist”.
So, whether you want to believe it or not, this is, indeed, a big deal.
Once again, BLN strives to say something without foul language and FAILS.
I care because some one got away with grand theft. Thats not something minor. It’s also pretty bad how much they pretty much thumbed their nose at the law. It also sets up a dangerous precedent.
Chen is a child. Self-centered and paranoid as only a child can be. His conduct regarding the iPhone4 debacle was dishonest and unforgivable, his public taunting of Gray Powell (the Apple guy that lost the phone) should be an embarrassment to Chen for the rest of his life. I have never visited the Gizmodo site since.. and never will.
Juvenile is right. These are the same children that used clickers to turn off whole banks of giant screen TVs at Comdex, and thought it was funny. I’m sure Chen wanted to be in one of those stoner movies like Harold and Kumar…
Guys lets be realistic, the reason why I visit MacDailyNews, Gizmodo, Engadget, MacRumors is to findout what and when new products are coming out, I don’t care what any company invested, all I care is my pocket, that if I bought an iphone 3, 4 months before the iphone 4 came out I would have been extremely pissed and I think that most visitors to this site is to be informed, know what products and when products are coming out