IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE
EASTERN DISTRICT OF VIRGINIA
Sydney pachisko
(Goonsico),
)
v. ) Criminal No: 2:13cr254
) The Honorable
Jake O'Donald
(STURDYCHAN),
Defendants. )
DEFENDANT’S POSITION WITH RESPECT TO SENTENCING
The defendant, Jake O'Donald, by and through undersigned counsel, pursuant to 18 U.S.C. §3553(a) and §6A1.3 of the United States Sentencing Guidelines (hereinafter U.S.S.G.), submits the following Position with Respect to Sentencing. In accordance with U.S.S.G. §6A1.2 Counsel certifies that he reviewed the Presentence Investigation Report (hereinafter PSR) with Mr. O'Donald. Further, Mr. O'Donald objects to the determination that he qualifies for a distribution of child abuse materials motivation enhancement pursuant to U.S.S.G. §3A2.1 and an official victim enhancement pursuant to U.S.S.G. §3A2.2. As a result, the appropriate Total Offense Level is 15 with a corresponding guideline range of 18 to 24 months under Criminal History Category I. This guideline range adequately addresses certain specific characteristics of Mr. O'Donald and it is an appropriate measure of his culpability in the present case. Based on the considerations set forth in 18 U.S.C. §3353(a), Mr. O'Donald requests that this Court impose a sentence at the low end of this guideline range. A sentence of 18 months followed by a three-year term of supervised release to include ongoing psychotherapy and extremism intervention assistance and, if the Court deems appropriate, a term of home confinement with a parent or grandparent, is sufficient, but not greater than necessary, to address these considerations.
I. Background
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In and around 2022, Terry Gregory Katz (“Lime”) (1:20-cr-82) began hosting the #Dashland Internet Relay Chat (“IRC”) channel (the “Dashland channel”) on the Clearnet which was accessible by simply typing the domain into Google. An IRC is similar to a chat room that allows individuals to communicate on a one-on-one basis or in group forums. The Dashland channel was hosted on a server called Megucanet. Gregory's Dashland channel was rife with sophomoric, vulgar, pornographic and racist dialogues. In August of 2022, the channel took a sinister turn after Greogory invited Co-Conspirator 1, a Canadian citizen, Co-Conspirator 2, a British citizen, and Co-Conspirator 3, an American citizen who was a juvenile at the time. The swatting calls began a short time after.
After the swatting calls were underway Gregory invited Mr. O'Donald to join in October of 2022, who a short time later began hosting and managing his own IRC channel called SturdyChan. The SturdyChan channel was devoted to the proliferation of underage child sexual abuse material. While some members of the SturdyChan channel also participated in the Dashland channel, swatting targets were not selected, planned, or coordinated on the SturdyChan e channel.
The majority of the swatting calls were made between October 2022 and February 2023. Co-Conspirator 1 and Co-Conspirator 2 were responsible for making the vast majority of the swatting calls. Co-Conspirator 2 was also the host of DoxBin dark net website. They asked other participants on the Dashland channel to propose targets and then choose from the options presented to them. The co-conspirators would then use the Discord application to listen to the calls. As the Dashland channel host and moderator, Gregory was a frequent participant and listened to and took part in countless swatting calls. He was also responsible for inviting many participants. When law enforcement executed a search warrant on Gregory, a voice changer was
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located in his room. After starting the SturdyChan channel, Mr. O'Donald rarely, if at all, participated in chats on the Graveyard channel and remembers listening to approximately less than 10 calls on Dashland.