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Comment by jstarfish | Hacker News Reader

I know what you're referring to but don't think this is one of those cases.

The affidavit is very thorough about what was found. Starts on page 3.

https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1566416/downl...

So Dropbox found uploads, allegedly from Meek, containing CP. Then devices were found at Meek's residence containing CP. To there, you could fake it: pwn the box, open a Dropbox, upload pictures. Basic parallel construction.

In items 30-53 we have an allegation that Meek exposed himself to children on Omegle. This is more damning. Included in the evidence are pictures apparently showing Meek naked. Harder to fake. His face does not seem to be visible in any of the images. Some legitimate communications of Meek are also on the phone, corresponding with his known whereabouts (and might be checked against the other end if possible).

Conclusion: if this is a frame, it's a very well-made one.

Why would he be framed, though? He made a documentary about a military embarrassment (the Tongo Tongo ambush), and many years ago he documented a case of apparent manslaughter (of an American) by a captain in Iraq. In short, he was not exactly a Seymour Hersh or a Glenn Greenwald. I just don't see the 3LAs going to this much trouble to bag a guy who wrote a story about Niger.

So I conclude the case is probably real.

Thought I'd put this down and save someone else the trouble.

Thank you, it’s hard to find reasonably good arguments like this in the HN comments these days.

FYI to anyone curious, do not read the affidavit if you do not want to have pretty horrific images of infants etc in your mind.

To split the difference a bit...

They have him "on tape" IMing multiple other suspects, talking extremely graphically about pedophilia, and exchanging images and video of same.

"on tape" meaning they have a video of him in front of a computer engaging in the conversation?

I skimmed through the affidavit & couldn't find that claim. It was difficult to read the content so I didn't look to deeply into it. Could you post a quote of the claim if it's there?

They don't claim to have video of him engaging in the conversation, but they do claim to have a pretty damning picture of him.

To support the idea that it was he who engaged in these messages, they claim that you can only be logged in to kik on one device at a time and have evidence that he was using the device for other purposes around the same time and in the same location as kik for at least one of these conversations.

That's my reading, anyways. Not a lawyer and have trouble with the stilted language in these kinds of things.

On tape as in they have the phone with messages on it, and the ip addeess and device info used to send the messages.

(As opposed to testimony, where you have someone else testifying that they SAW him doing it, but no way of proving that post facto)

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