Autism Defense Again

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Like we need another killer associated with us.

A MAN who admits to having a very poor driving record this week blamed the fact that he suffers from Asperger’s Syndrome for the number of times he has been banned from driving.

Keith John Mileham, 35, of Chowle Farm, Great Coxwell, Faringdon, appeared before magistrates in Swindon on Tuesday asking for a motoring case heard in his absence to be re-opened.

Representing himself in court, Mileham, who had pleaded guilty by post to driving a Ford Transit van without a driving licence or insurance at Church Hill, Wroughton on October 16 this year, told the bench he could not attend the previous hearing of the case because he had been in prison for other, unrelated, matters.

enager who administered the botnet behind some of the world's biggest distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks has escaped jail following a criminal trial.

of compromised computers was used to carry out a range of DDoS attacks, with targets including EE, Vodafone, O2, NatWest, BT, Amazon, Virgin Media and the BBC.

Investigators claim that Chappell was working as an administrator for vDOS, which was previously the world's biggest DDoS-for-hire platform. Israeli Police ordered a shut down of the service in 2016.

Although Chappell didn't create vDOS, he played a crucial role in its running. The service was created by cyber crooks known as Yarden "applej4ck" Bidani and Itay "p1st" Huri.

Chappell was only 15 when he began working with them. His job was to maintain the service and its botnet, although he also conducted his own DDoS attacks on the side.

The teen claims to suffer from a form of autism, and his defence argued that his employers were taking advantage of him. They claimed in court that he was "mischievous" rather than malicious.

Orange Park’s online troll who encouraged a terrorist attack in Garland, Texas, and who tried to assist another in Kansas City pleaded guilty Wednesday.

Joshua Ryne Goldberg, who was 20 when arrested two years ago, was contacted by someone on Twitter who said he was a college student who lived an hour away and was looking to build a bomb. Goldberg, who is now 22, gave the man instructions. No bomb was ever built, but the man was working with the FBI and agents then arrested Goldberg for teaching or demonstrating the making of explosive devices.

Wednesday federal prosecutors recommended the judge sentence Goldberg to eight years in prison and that he continue undergoing treatment for mental health issues while in prison. Goldberg could face up to 20 years and will be sentenced at a later date.

As Goldberg entered the Jacksonville courtroom in his orange jumpsuit and shackles, he quickly waved to his father who was sitting in the back.

When he was arrested, Goldberg initially told agents he had hoped the person would kill himself trying to make the bomb, according to the affidavit. He said if the person successfully created the bomb, he would have alerted authorities before the attack and would be a hero.

Goldberg, who has been identified as Jewish, maintained a manic online presence. He adopted contrarian personalities, seemingly with the express intent of offending others, such as an ISIS-affiliated Australian jihadist, a white supremacist, a feminist and a free-speech radical.

Goldberg’s attorney, Paul Shorstein, told reporters that his client lived his life on the internet, rarely leaving his home, and he lived through his various conflicting personas. Goldberg, Shorstein said, told others he wanted to be a journalist infiltrating terrorist cells.

“There’s definitely more to it than just some a——— doing a prank. He’s not ISIS. There’s nothing about him that’s ISIS,” Shorstein said. “But there is a little more to it than just being an online troll. He did do those things. He did send those links. He did tell the guy here’s what you should do. He was interacting with real people and saying do this, do that. Now the question is: Did he really mean to do it? Or is this just part of some skewed mental health problem where you’re trying to make your way in life? Or is it a combination of both where you have some fatalistic view of life?”

In May 2015 he urged followers on Twitter to attack a Dallas suburb where people planned on mocking the Prophet Muhammad. He also posted a map of the event, which was retweeted by one of the two men who did end up attacking. Those two men were the only ones who died during the attack.

He told a chatroom that he had only pretended to be a member of ISIS, according to the criminal complaint. He also said he didn’t expect “keyboard warriors” to actually carry out an attack.

A George Washington University report on ISIS in America called Goldberg’s case “perhaps the most puzzling” that it assessed.

Shorstein said he expects a lot more will come out about Goldberg’s mental health problems and his internet activities at sentencing. Goldberg, he said, has Asperger’s syndrome and has been diagnosed with clinical depression.

Sherwin Shayegan, 34, of Washington State, was "wearing a distinctive Seattle Seahawks hat and other clothing" that allowed Port Authority police to find him at a local hotel a short time after the 3:10 p.m. incident Friday, the authority's Joseph Pentangelo said.

The boy told police he was at the Terminal A carousel when Shayegan "began to massage his back without permission," Pentangelo said.

Shayegan also handed him a note, with cash, the boy added.

"This is money for letting me give you a massage. Thank you," the 5-foot-9-inch, 245-pound suspect wrote along with "additional, alarming content," Pentangelo said.

Two years ago, Shayegan was charged with grabbing the arm of a player at a high school hockey game in Virginia and trying to pull him into a locker room.

Before then, he'd spent several years going from state to state posing as an adult member of a high school basketball team.

Police said he touched players and asked for piggyback rides. His mother said he has Asperger's and was compulsively reliving part of a youth spent as a high school team manager.

In the Virginia case, a judge suspended 10 months of a year's sentence, put Shayegan on probation and ordered him to complete a mental health evaluation.

Matthew David Potts, of Robert Street, Barrow, pleaded guilty to two counts of sexual activity with a girl under 16.

At Barrow Crown Court on Tuesday January 9, Barbara Webster, defending, said: "He suffers from Asperger's and that has clearly impacted on his thought process here.

"He admits he still feels like a boy and has a lot of child-like mannerisms.

"He accepts his feelings about the victim were wrong and he is very ashamed about it.

"He also has a drug problem and is a daily user of cannabis.

"Because of his Asperger's, he is vulnerable and will find an immediate prison sentence very traumatic."

Judge Jonathan Gibson handed Potts a three-year community order to run concurrently for both offences.

"You think more like a child than an adult.

"I would usually have imposed a suspended sentence for this offence but I can only do that for a maximum of two years.

"The probation service feel they need to work with you for three years and I think you will respond well to working with the probation service."

The 36-month community order includes a 40-day rehabilitation activity with a sex offender treatment programme.

Potts was also handed a five-year Sexual Harm Prevention Order banning him from unsupervised contact with female children under 16.

He must also sign the sex offender register for the next five years.

So aspies are now ret*ds now?

If he did that in the US, he would be in prison. A diagnoses will not keep you out of jail.

A TEENAGER WHO raped a 13-year-old boy and sexually assaulted another has received a suspended sentence on condition he continue to engage with multidisciplinary supports and treatment.

The now 18-year-old, was convicted following a Central Criminal Court trial in 2016 of one count of anal rape and two counts of sexual assault in the Midlands in July 2015.

The court heard the accused, who was 16 at the time of the offences, had a “sad and difficult upbringing” and was diagnosed with ADHD at a young age. Doctors later said he was also on the autism spectrum.

During his trial the accused said the incidents were consensual and described them as “an experiment gone wrong”. The court heard on an earlier date that the victims are still in counselling but are slowly getting over the events.

I notice many of the Autism Defense stories coming out of the UK lately.

A convicted sex offender has been fined after failing to notify authorities he was staying in a house with children.

Alexander Hunt breached the notification requirements of a sexual offences prevention order made against him as part of a 2015 conviction for sexually assaulting an 11-year-old girl.

A court heard in 2015 that Hunt had pulled down the girl's pyjama bottoms as she lay in bed and performed an indecent act.

But a judge suspended his prison sentence after hearing that Hunt had Asperger’s and did not realise the seriousness of what he was doing.

Between November 10 and 13, 2017 Hunt failed to comply with the terms of his sentence by staying in excess of 12 hours in a house where children under 18 years old lived.

A convicted sex offender has been fined after failing to notify authorities he was staying in a house with children.

Alexander Hunt breached the notification requirements of a sexual offences prevention order made against him as part of a 2015 conviction for sexually assaulting an 11-year-old girl.

A court heard in 2015 that Hunt had pulled down the girl's pyjama bottoms as she lay in bed and performed an indecent act.

But a judge suspended his prison sentence after hearing that Hunt had Asperger’s and did not realise the seriousness of what he was doing.

Between November 10 and 13, 2017 Hunt failed to comply with the terms of his sentence by staying in excess of 12 hours in a house where children under 18 years old lived.

Drunken thugs ransacked Plymouth woman's flat after asking her neighbour for a crow bar

Appearing for sentencing at Plymouth Crown Court on January 18 , Judge Paul Darlow heard that Hunt, 22, had called his supervising police officer on November 10, 2017 to tell them of his intent to stay at another address that weekend, but the PC did not receive his message until Monday, November 13.

When questioned, Hunt, of Dorchester Road, Taunton, revealed there were two boys, aged seven and 11, in the house. Hunt said he had informed the guardian of his offences, but when the police called the parent to confirm, they had no knowledge of Hunt's convictions.

Hunt was therefore in breach of the requirement of his Sexual Harm Prevention Order and was therefore also in breach of his suspended sentence, which would have expired later that month. He was arrested and pleaded guilty at Plymouth Magistrates'

Speaking for the defence, Jason Beale told the Crown Court this was Hunt's first breach of the order for the best part of two years, he had been living in compliance with the orders and no new offence had been committed to cause the breach.

A British teenager managed to access the communications accounts of top US intelligence and security officials including the then CIA chief John Brennan, a London court heard.

Kane Gamble, now 18, was aged 15 and 16 when, from his bedroom in Coalville, central England, he managed to impersonate his targets to gain highly sensitive information.

"Kane Gamble gained access to the communications accounts of some very high-ranking US intelligence officials and government employees," prosecutor John Lloyd-Jones told England's Old Bailey central criminal court.

"He also gained access to US law enforcement and intelligence agency networks."

Gamble has admitted 10 offences against the computer misuse act, between June 2015 and February 2016, and is awaiting sentencing.

The court heard how the teenager founded the group Crackas With Attitude (CWA), who used "social engineering" - manipulating call centres and help desks into divulging confidential information - which they then exploited.

Gamble impersonated Brennan in calls to the telecommunications companies Verizon and AOL, although in one attempt, he stumbled on a question about Brennan's first pet.

Several sensitive documents were reportedly obtained from Brennan's private email inbox and Gamble managed to get information about military and intelligence operations in Iran and Afghanistan.

"It also seems he was able to successfully access Mr Brennan's iCloud account," the prosecutor said.

Gamble called AOL and initiated a password reset, and took control of Brennan's wife's iPad.

Gamble also targeted the then US secretary of homeland security Jeh Johnson and made calls to his phone number.

He left Johnson's wife a voicemail saying "Am I scaring you?" and managed to get a message to appear on the family television saying: "I own you".

Other targets included the then US president Barack Obama's deputy national security adviser Avril Haines, his senior science and technology adviser John Holdren, and FBI special agent Amy Hess.

Gamble gained extensive unauthorised access to the US Department of Justice network and was able to access court case files, including on the Deepwater oil spill.

The British teenager gave some of the material he managed to access to WikiLeaks and boasted that he had a list of all Homeland Security employees.

The court heard from consultant forensic psychiatrist Dr Steffan Davies, whose assessment was that Gamble did not have a full understanding of the impact of what he was doing, due to autism. "I'm very clear that he has an autistic spectrum disorder (ASD)," he said.

"He spent most of his life in his bedroom on the internet and that is where he is getting his cues from.

"He has a very black and white understanding of what was happening, seeing it more as a video game with goodies and baddies. "He was trying to right what he saw as an injustice."

However, another expert, Dr Philip Joseph, said he doubted Gamble was autistic. "He's at the mild end (of the spectrum), if he's on it at all," he said. "If he had that condition, it doesn't explain why he committed these offences."