Up to 30 years in prison - scary yes - but I don't see a minimum sentencing guide line. So we don’t know what kind of deal if any they had in the works.
Yes I’m sure that in the unlikely event that he could have plead down to a few months in jail followed by several years of probation, the probation would have strictly limited if not outright prohibited the use of a computer and access to the internet.
Personally, I firmly believe that he should have gotten at least 3 months in jail but no more than a year with a year of probation that prohibited access to a computer.
I don’t care if he was creating internet changing technologies at 14 or at 7 – it is irrelevant to the case. Nor does it matter that he was pulling from JSTOR (beyond the fact that it was a secure and not publicly accessible system).
Once again, the facts in the case are that he repeatedly circumvented security to gain unauthorized access to a system causing thousands of dollars in damages to MIT and JSTOR as they had to repeatedly kick him off and restore system integrity. I do not see a single reason for why his charges should have been dropped outright or why he should NOT be on probation. Because he’s brilliant?
Regardless of the nobility of his goals, his actions were criminal even given a conservative reading of the current law.
We can argue about the laws involved if you like, but I fear that you will find it pretty tough to make a computer security law that holds any water and yet lets you plug in unauthorized laptops in network closets legally.