Sutcliffe

BACKGROUND

Defendant, a computer technician, was hired by Global Crossing Development Company in August 2001. Shortly thereafter, however, his employment was terminated because he refused to provide the Human Resources Department with his social security number, Global Crossing discovered that he had failed to disclose past criminal convictions on his job application, and he threatened the director of Human Resources. After his termination, Defendant began picketing outside the Global Crossing building with a sign referring to a website he had created. On this website, Defendant dis- played Global Crossing employees’ personal information, including payroll information, social security numbers, birth dates, and residential addresses, with some of this information hyperlinked to an article about identity theft.

When Global Crossing’s manager of policy enforcement was informed of the website, he began periodically archiving copies of the website. These copies were turned over to the FBI, which also archived screen-shots of the website on three occasions. As they visited the website, Global Crossing offi- cials and the FBI saw increasing amounts of personal infor- mation posted…