Charles Littlejohn: Man who stole and leaked Trump tax records sentenced to 5 years in prison ( www.cnn.com )

The man who stole and leaked former President Donald Trump and thousands of other’s tax records has been sentenced to five years in prison.

In October, Charles Littlejohn, 38, pleaded guilty to one count of unauthorized disclosures of income tax returns. According to his plea agreement, he stole Trump’s tax returns along with the tax data of “thousands of the nation’s wealthiest people,” while working for a consulting firm with contracts with the Internal Revenue Service.

Littlejohn leaked the information to two news outlets and deleted the documents from his IRS-assigned laptop before returning it and covered the rest of his digital tracks by deleting places where he initially stored the information.

Judge Ana Reyes highlighted the gravity of the crime, saying multiple times that it amounted to an attack against the US and its legal foundation.

HawlSera ,

In a sane world, he would have been given a Medal of Honor

KeefChief13 ,

🫡

alienanimals ,

Charles Littlejohn is a hero.

njm1314 ,

Anyone has ever deserved a pardon it's this guy

Fur_Fox_Sheikh ,

I've actually met this guy a few years ago... crazy... he was a pretty nice guy from what I recall - brought homemade cinnamon buns to a party.

Anyways, his friends set up a gofundme to donate for his legal fees, since of course it costs thousands to continue defending himself and his actions...

pinkdrunkenelephants ,

How was he not protected under whistleblower laws?

aidan ,

You mean the ones that protected Snowden, Assange, and Manning?

linearchaos ,
@linearchaos@lemmy.world avatar

They made an example of them. That judge is well enough off to be thoroughly upset that somebody might release their crooked tax documents.

Honestly I think they should slip something into the law, for this type of leak if the person was lying and you release the document proving them lying that you get a slap on the wrist.

AeonFelis ,

Honestly I think they should slip something into the law

Remind me again who are "they" exactly, and what are their incentives?

callouscomic ,

Leak a billionaires tax records: 5 years.

Literally rape while a billionaire: 0 years.

Snapz ,

If society survives long enough for this to become history, the act will be seen as as heroic. The hardest thing for the relatively comfortable, myself included, to do these days is risk that relative comfort and sacrifice our futures (civil and professional) for something that acts against all of the slow motion attacks on democracy going on right now. I don't know enough about him individually to say, but the act on its face us heroic and needed.

iamjackflack ,

Biden needs to pardon this guy right after elections

ripcord ,
@ripcord@lemmy.world avatar

He won't. Man drives me nuts.

andrew_bidlaw ,
@andrew_bidlaw@sh.itjust.works avatar

Is there a way to write him a letter? Idk how your prison system works, but this dude needs some encouragement for what he did.

gAlienLifeform ,
@gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world avatar

Is there a way to write him a letter?

Theoretically, yes, that should be a big old 1st amendment free speech right, but since this is a legal right for a poor person expect it to be a big pain to exercise

Anyway, all the instructions should be on this page here

https://web.archive.org/web/20240129195016/https://www.bop.gov/inmates/communications.jsp

However each of those methods is going to require getting a match on the inmate locator, and since I don't think he is actually incarcerated yet there aren't any matching results (and it will probably take some time after he's been incarcerated for his record to start showing up)

I also found what looks like a GoFundMe page for him, which might be a way to get in contact with his family and friends, which might be a better way of contacting him (among other things, the prison email system only allows inmates to send messages to approved contacts and they're limited to 30 of those, so sending everything to someone with regular email who could be one of those contacts and just forward things along might work best) - https://web.archive.org/save/https://www.gofundme.com/f/charles-littlejohns-legal-defense-fund

I should add I haven't verified that GoFundMe is legitimate, but it looks like it is

generalpotato ,

Exposing a convicted criminal is a crime against the US and its legal foundation? GTFOH.

On the other hand, maybe said “legal foundation” is said to protect those with money and influence and punish those who dare to move beyond the systemic injustices present. Maybe this judge was correct after all.

doctorcrimson ,

Pretty damn fast compared to how long its taking to prosecute Trump.

PrettyLights ,

...because the leaker plead guilty. If he went to trial this would have taken longer.

Does no one read the article or understand basic legal processes?

doctorcrimson ,

Technically the pleading guilty part is also in the footer below the post for users on desktop, but I was making a statement about due processes rather than complaining Charles case was too quick. Kind of akin to how a person mentions the beauty of the colors clouds or the dread incurred by a coming storm just for somebody else to come along and yell "...Obviously. Does nobody watch the forecast or understand basic meteorology?"

groupofcrows ,

This man is a hero.

AllonzeeLV ,

This is what the US does to heros that speak truth I to the owner class.

BigMacHole ,

That's RIGHT! Releasing Tax Returns gets you MORE Jail Time then trying to violently overthrow the United States Government and HANG the Vice President! That will teach Hostile Countries to MESS with US!

gAlienLifeform ,
@gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world avatar

The way we turned our backs on Afghani interpreters who tried to get asylum here should have shown Charles Littlejohn what happens to people who fight for America

jeremyparker ,

He probably knew. There are more stories of bad outcomes for that kind of shit than good ones. The fact that he did it anyway is why his actions are so admirable and heroic.

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