Hawkins

After hearing testimony for six days, a jury acquitted defendant David Wesley Hawkins of a charge of misappropriating a trade secret (count 1; Pen. Code, § 499c) and convicted him of a relatively new computer crime, the felony of knowingly accessing and taking data from a computer system (count 2; § 502, subd. (c)(2)). The jury found not tme that the property taken, source code, was valued at more than $2.5 million. (§ 12022.6, subd. (a)(4).)

The trial court denied defendant’s motions for new trial and to reduce the offense to a misdemeanor. The court suspended imposition of sentence and placed defendant on formal probation for three years, on condition, among others, that he serve six months in jail.

On appeal defendant contends: his crime should not be a felony as the statute, section 502, subdivision (c)(2), lacks a mens rea requirement; the statute is unconstitutionally vague; the trial court erred in admitting evidence of prior misconduct by defendant and in admitting printouts of computer access times; the trial court should have given a unanimity instruction; the trial court should have granted his motion to reduce the offense to a misdemeanor. For the reasons…