XPost: alt.marketing.online.ebay, alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, talk.politics.guns   
   XPost: alt.society.liberalism   
   From: ha-ha@ebray.com   
      
   BOSTON (AP) — Online retailer eBay Inc. will pay a $3 million fine to   
   resolve criminal charges over a harassment campaign waged by employees who   
   sent live spiders, cockroaches and other disturbing items to the home of a   
   Massachusetts couple, according to court papers filed Thursday.   
      
   The Justice Department charged eBay with stalking, witness tampering and   
   obstruction of justice more than three years after the employees were   
   prosecuted in the extensive scheme to intimidate David and Ina Steiner.   
   The couple produced an online newsletter called EcommerceBytes that upset   
   eBay executives with its coverage.   
      
   California-headquartered eBay accepted responsibility for the employees'   
   actions and entered into a deferred prosecution agreement that could   
   result in the charges against the company being dismissed if it complies   
   with certain conditions, according to the U.S. attorney's office in   
   Massachusetts.   
      
   “EBay engaged in absolutely horrific, criminal conduct. The company’s   
   employees and contractors involved in this campaign put the victims   
   through pure hell, in a petrifying campaign aimed at silencing their   
   reporting and protecting the eBay brand,” acting Massachusetts U.S.   
   Attorney Josh Levy said in an emailed statement.   
      
   The deferred prosecution agreement calls for an independent monitor to   
   oversee the company for three years to ensure its compliance with the   
   terms and federal law. The $3 million criminal penalty was the maximum   
   possible fine under the charges.   
      
   Ebay CEO Jamie Iannone called the company's conduct in 2019 “wrong and   
   reprehensible."   
      
   “Since these events occurred, new leaders have joined the company, and   
   eBay has strengthened its policies, procedures, controls and training,"   
   Iannone said in a statement. “EBay remains committed to upholding high   
   standards of conduct and ethics and to making things right with the   
   Steiners.”   
      
   The couple, who served as the newsletter’s publisher and editor, have sued   
   eBay in federal court, describing how cyberstalking and upsetting   
   deliveries of anonymously sent packages upended their lives.   
      
   Ina Steiner received harassing and sometimes threatening Twitter messages   
   as well as dozens of strange emails from groups like an irritable bowel   
   syndrome patient support group and the Communist Party of the United   
   States.   
      
   Along with a box of live spiders and the cockroaches, the couple had a   
   funeral wreath, a bloody pig mask and a book about surviving the loss of a   
   spouse show up at their door. Their home address also was posted online   
   with announcements inviting strangers to yard sales and parties.   
      
   In a statement published on their website Thursday, the Steiners said   
   eBay’s actions had “a damaging and permanent impact” on them “emotionally,   
   psychologically, physically, reputationally, and financially.” They also   
   expressed frustration that more executives were not charged.   
      
   “We strongly pushed federal prosecutors for further indictments to deter   
   corporate executives and board members from creating a culture where   
   stalking and harassment is tolerated or encouraged,” they said.   
      
   The harassment started in 2019 after Ina Steiner wrote a story about a   
   lawsuit brought by eBay that accused Amazon of poaching its sellers,   
   according to court records.   
      
   A half-hour after the article was published, eBay's then-CEO, Devin Wenig,   
   sent another top executive a message saying: “If you are ever going to   
   take her down ... now is the time,” according to court documents. The   
   executive sent Wenig’s message to James Baugh, who was eBay's senior   
   director of safety and security, and called Ina Steiner a “biased troll   
   who needs to get BURNED DOWN.”   
      
   Baugh was among seven former employees who ultimately pleaded guilty to   
   charges in the case. He was sentenced in 2022 to almost five years in   
   prison. Another former executive, David Harville, was sentenced to two   
   years.   
      
   Wenig, who stepped down as CEO in 2019, was not criminally charged in the   
   case and has denied having any knowledge of the harassment campaign or   
   ever telling anyone to do anything illegal. In the civil case, his lawyers   
   have said the “take her down” quote was taken out of context and the   
   natural inference should be that he was referring to taking “lawful   
   action,” not “a series of bizarre criminal acts.”   
      
   The Associated Press sent an email seeking comment on Thursday to a   
   spokesperson for Wenig.   
      
   Baugh, whom prosecutors described as the mastermind of the scheme, at one   
   point recruited Harville to go with him to Boston to spy on the Steiners,   
   authorities said. Baugh, Harville and another eBay employee went to the   
   couple’s home in the hopes of installing a GPS tracker on their car,   
   prosecutors said. The trio found the garage locked, so Harville bought   
   tools with a plan to break in, prosecutors said.   
      
   Harville’s attorneys have said he had no involvement in or knowledge about   
   the threatening messages or deliveries sent by his colleagues.   
      
   Baugh’s lawyers have said their client faced relentless pressure from   
   Wenig and other executives to do something about the Steiners. Baugh   
   alleged he was then pushed out by the company when “an army of outside   
   lawyers descended to conduct an ‘internal investigation’ aimed at saving   
   the company and its top executives from prosecution.”   
      
   https://www.yahoo.com/news/feds-charge-ebay-over-employees-173744152.html   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)