Russian hacker faces decades in prison

SEATTLE: US federal prosecutors want the Russian man convicted of hacking into US businesses to steal credit card data to be sentenced to 30 years in prison and ordered to pay $170 million in restitution.

But Roman Seleznev’s lawyers say his troubled history, poor health and willingness to help the government catch other cybercriminals should be considered when deciding his sentence.

Seleznev, the son of a member of the Russian Parliament, was first indicted in 2011 on 29 felony charges and was captured in 2014. US Secret Service agents, with the help of local police, arrested Seleznev in the Maldives as he and his girlfriend arrived at the airport on their way back to Russia. The agents flew him by private jet to Guam, where he made his first court appearance, and then to Seattle, where he was placed in federal custody.

The indictment grew to 40 counts in October 2014 and his trial was held in August 2016. The jury found him guilty on 38 charges, including nine counts of hacking and 10 counts of wire fraud.

“Seleznev enriched himself by these activities and lived an extravagant lifestyle at the expense of small, hard-working business owners who saw their businesses either damaged or destroyed as a result of Seleznev’s attacks,” federal prosecutors said in their pre-sentence memo to the US District Court in Seattle.

“His victims include over 3,700 different financial institutions, over 500 businesses around the world and millions of individual credit card holders.”

His prosecution is “unprecedented,” the deputy US attorneys who worked on the case told the judge.

“Never before has a criminal engaged in computer fraud of this magnitude been identified, captured and convicted by an American jury,” they said. That is why his sentence should reflect the severity of his crime, they said.

“There is tremendous public interest in deterring cybercrime,” prosecutors said.

Seleznev’s lawyer, Igor Litvak, told the judge that leniency is appropriate. Seleznev has accepted responsibility for his crimes and deeply regrets that his actions caused financial losses to various victims, Litvak said.