In the beginning, prosecutors feared the jury might feel sorry for Bruce Raisley. After all, the 48-year-old software programmer was tricked into leaving his wife by an online vigilante group, costing him his job and leaving his family in tatters. Then he was humiliated when the strange tale was recounted, in all its bawdy detail, by two magazines. "Bruce...
Bruce Raisley enters the federal courthouse in Camden on Sept. 15.In the beginning, prosecutors feared the jury might feel sorry for Bruce Raisley.
After all, the 48-year-old software programmer was tricked into leaving his wife by an online vigilante group, costing him his job and leaving his family in tatters. Then he was humiliated when the strange tale was recounted, in all its bawdy detail, by two magazines.
"Bruce Raisley’s anger is understandable. His frustration is excusable. But ladies and gentlemen, what Bruce Raisley did next was not," Lee Vartan, an assistant U.S. attorney, said during opening arguments of Raisley’s trial in federal court in Camden.
What Raisley did next, authorities say, was unleash a virus around the globe that directed more 100,000 computers to attack the web sites of the magazines that published the articles. In the end, the jurors didn’t show Raisley much sympathy.
After deliberating less than five hours, the jury convicted him yesterday of accessing computers without authorization. He faces up to 10 years in prison.
"Regardless of Raisley’s motivations, his attacks on computer systems were misdirected vengeance. It is unacceptable when a personal vendetta turns into criminal behavior," U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman said.
The story of Raisley’s trial begins in 2004, when he first encountered an online organization called Perverted Justice. The group — which worked with "Dateline NBC" to produce the reality program "To Catch a Predator" — trains volunteers to pose as children on the Internet to expose and humiliate pedophiles.
At first, Raisley applauded the group. But he became an exceedingly vocal critic in 2005 when he claimed the organization’s founder, Xavier Von Erck, used a photograph of Raisley’s 10-year-old son to lure a predator. (Von Erck denies this. And even Raisley’s wife told prosecutors she doubts the child’s picture was ever used.)
Nonetheless, Raisley was incensed. He railed against Von Erck in chat rooms. And, according to members of Perverted Justice, he tried to incite violence against them.
So Von Erck got even.
The 31-year-old Portland, Ore., native directed one of his volunteers to pose as an adult woman named "Holly." She introduced herself to Raisley online. When he asked for a photograph, she emailed a picture of the actress Naomi Watts. Their chats turned steamy. And Raisley fell in love, authorities said.
Xavier Von Erck, left, founder of Internet group Perverted Justice, and Bruce Raisley, right. Raisley now faces 10 years behind bars after attacking websites that told the story of how Von Erck humiliated him.Finally, in the fall of 2005, Raisley agreed to leave his wife and son to meet "Holly" at an airport near his home in Arkansas. "Holly" never showed, but Von Erck sent a photographer to shoot Raisley waiting with flowers. He was humiliated, particularly when the episode was recounted — replete with Raisley’s X-rated missives to "Holly" — in Rolling Stone and Radar Magazine.
So Raisley attacked the web sites of the magazines and the Rick A. Ross Institute of New Jersey, which also posted the articles. He is scheduled to be sentenced Jan. 7, said Erez Liebermann, an assistant U.S. attorney.
Von Erck did not respond to a request for comment yesterday. Several weeks ago, he said in an email that he is not eager to see Raisley go to prison.
"Personally, I think the guy needs serious state-mandated mental health (treatment) in a psychiatric hospital," Von Erck wrote.