Matt DeHart

Early life and education

As Matt DeHart's parents, Paul and Leann (married in 1978), were both members of the U.S. military, he lived and grew up in many different places: Fort Meade, Maryland (age 1-2); Wheeler Air Force Base, Hawaii (age 2-4); Prattville, Alabama (K–3rd grade), Fort Meade (4th grade); Prattville (5th grade); Birdsboro, Pennsylvania (6th grade); Randolph, New Jersey (7th – 11th grades); Washington Township, Pennsylvania (12th grade); Elmira, New York (2002–2005); and Newburgh, Indiana (2005–2010). The DeHart family is based on military tradition and Christian and conservative beliefs.

From an early age, DeHart was a tech geek. He started a group called KAOS (Kaos Anti-Security Operations Syndicate) in 2000. He graduated from high school in 2002. He took classes through Corning Community College; BOCES, Horseheads New York; and IVY Tech Indianapolis, Indiana. In 2004, he spent time on 4chan, a message board which gave birth to Anonymous. Besides socializing and gaming online, DeHart developed interests in encryption, internet freedom and privacy. In 2008, he took part in Project Chanology, Anonymous' anti-Scientology campaign.

Career

In 2008, DeHart enlisted in the U.S. Air National Guard, becoming an intelligence analyst. In June 2009, he was discharged from the National Guard, with an honorable discharge, as a consequence of a diagnosis of depression. DeHart says after his superiors had learned about his activism he had been offered a lump sum if he resigned but he had refused to do so.

Receipt of documents

DeHart was involved in online activities with a small group 'Anonymous Anti-Security' using the anonymity network Tor. As a part of these activities, DeHart ran a dead drop server named 'The Shell', on a computer in his bedroom. In September 2009, while monitoring the server, DeHart found an unencrypted folder containing hundreds of documents, including one detailing what looked like an FBI investigation into some particularly shady deeds by the CIA. He deleted the unencrypted folder from the server, but kept screenshots. Shortly afterwards he found an encrypted version of the same file placed on another hidden server he believes was meant for WikiLeaks.

DeHart also claims "a document dropped onto his Tor server included details of FBI’s investigation into CIA’s possible role in the anthrax attack".

January 22, 2010 he received a 'pretty detailed tip' from an associate who claims they were asked about the server by the FBI related to the file from a few months previously. At this point he shut down his server entirely and destroyed its hard drives.

Initial charges and indictment

On January 22, 2010, the State of Indiana issued a search warrant for the DeHart's home in Newburgh in with the expressed purpose of searching for child pornography. The search was executed in January 25, seizing DeHart’s computers and every data storage capable device that could be found. However, two encrypted IronKey USB devices with the sensitive server data were stored in the family gun case at the time and were overlooked. DeHart suggests the drive may have also contained documents from his former military unit. During the forensic analysis of the evidence seized, officers stated child pornography was found.

Following these seizures, DeHart drove to Mexico where he mailed one drive to a contact in the United Kingdom and the other to a contact in the United States. Shortly after he would travel with his father to the Russian Embassy in Washington DC to seek asylum. The request would be denied, as would a subsequent request at the Venezuelan embassy.

In March 2010 DeHart applied for a US updated passport, which he got in less than a month. The following month, April 2010, DeHart moved to Montreal, Canada and started an eight-week French immersion course with ILSC-Montreal, staying at a home with other international students. DeHart planned to take a welding class at Holland College in Prince Edward Island, and his parents settled him into a studio apartment in Charlottetown, near Holland College campus. Whilst applying for a student visa at US border patrol office and after handing over his US passport, DeHart was arrested and taken into custody by FBI agents. US authorities contacted police in Charlottetown, asking for his studio apartment to be searched as part of a child pornography investigation. The material seized from DeHart’s apartment was not sent to Tennessee but to the FBI's field office in Washington DC, U.S. Department of Justice.

Dehart was placed in a cell at Calais' Large International Avenue Immigration and Customs Enforcement Detention Center for questioning. He claims he was drugged and describes the treatment he received as "torture". He was taken unconscious in an ambulance from the Penobscot County Jail, Bangor, ME to the Eastern Maine Medical Center before 1am on August 7. The records from the Eastern Maine Medical Center show he was diagnosed with eye pain and a psychotic break. He was released in “guarded” condition to unnamed officials and sent back to the jail. He was further interrogated by the FBI that same day while suffering from a psychotic break. The results of that interrogation are classified. He was questioned about his military unit, Russian Embassy, Anonymous, and WikiLeaks.

They started with people in my military unit, what the connection was between them, me and the Russian embassy; and then started asking me about connections between people in my military unit and Anonymous. They also asked about WikiLeaks

Later DeHart was transferred and kept in segregation at the Penobscot County jail in Bangor, Maine. Until his first hearing (Habeas Corpus hearing), he was incommunicado.

On August 9, 2010 DeHart was brought before U.S. Court Judge Margaret Kravchuk who branded his court appearance that day as “odd”. On August 18, 2010, DeHart signed consent forms (such as the permission for any FBI agent and “any Canadian law enforcement”, to record his phone calls with his old military colleagues) and authorized agents to assume his online identity, giving the FBI his aliases, and passwords to his e-mail accounts. Among the accounts was a Hushmail account in the name of “Fawkes”.

DeHart was then transferred to Tennessee, where he spent 21 months in jail, allegedly because of the child pornography charges against him. In May 2012, Judge Aleta Trauger who was allowed to read classified documents about DeHart and heard the evidence on the child pornography charges, ordered DeHart releasing to a jail, with a curfew monitored via an ankle bracelet, pending trial. Judge Trauger said in her ruling:

He thought that the search for child pornography was really a ruse to try to get the proof about his extracurricular national security issues. I found him very credible on that issue. Obviously, child pornography charges are serious offenses. I have learned several aspects of this case which, in the court’s mind, indicate the weight of the evidence is not as firm as I thought it was

Indecent videos were reported to be found on DeHart's computer seized in January 2012; however, they were not sent to Tennessee but to the FBI's field office. Two years after DeHart's arrest in Canada, the US Department of Justice admitted there were classified reports on him which confirmed he was arrested "for questioning in an espionage matter"; it was a "national security investigation" but made no mention of pornography.

From May 2012 until April 2013 Matt DeHart was on bond living with his parents in a rented duplex in Newburgh Indiana. His travel was restricted to the US Southern District of Indiana and was monitored with a curfew.

Canadian asylum attempt

On April 2013, DeHart's father drove him to the border crossing between Minnesota and Fort Frances, Ontario. As they reached the CBSA, they provided documents to make an asylum claim in accordance with the UN Convention Against Torture.

The CBSA began processing the DeHarts' asylum claim on April 3. The DeHarts stayed at a local hotel in Canada and reported back to the CBSA offices on April 4. The CBSA found Matt was "inadmissible" to Canada based on the charges in the US, a warrant for failure to appear in court on April 4, and suspicion of espionage. They issued a suspended deportation order against him, pending the results of an Admissibility Hearing and a Refugee Hearing to which he was eligible as a refugee claimant. While in Canadian custody he was eligible for regular monthly detention reviews conducted by the Immigration and Refugee Board. The August 2013 detention review found his bond proposal acceptable and ordered him released on bond. He was not released until the next month because the CBSA fought the decision in court. A court ruling upheld the release decision and he was released in to his parent's custody under very strict monitoring conditions.

In August 2013 DeHart was released from jail ordered to remain under house arrest, in Brampton, Ontario, with a GPS tracking unit and a radio frequency monitor locked to his ankle. Because of the CBSA and the government of Canada concession that DeHart suffers from PTSD, he is allowed to leave his apartment for medical treatments and for legal appointments.

On April 22, 2014 under request by Brampton landlord, DeHart moved to another apartment. Though his monitoring was in place, the following day, a CBSA officer and five policemen arrested him for breaching his release terms.

After breaching him on the technical reporting issue in April 2014, he was housed at the Central East Detention Center, a super-jail, in Lindsay, Ontario, where he was housed with other immigration detainees.

He is alleged to have tried to commit suicide twice while in Canadian custody.

The Admissibility Hearing found him inadmissible on 21 October 2014 but the deportation order was still suspended following the outcome of the Refugee Hearing.

The Refugee Hearing decision was announced on 5 Feb 2015. The tribunal acknowledged the validity of his refugee claim and unlike the Admissibility Hearing did not exclude him from entering Canada and seeking refugee protection because the evidence submitted against him was deemed weak. DeHart had access to state protection in the US to address the concerns in his refugee claim and was therefore denied refugee status in Canada. Canadian legal procedures available to Matthew DeHart were exhausted and the deportation order (from 4 April 2013) came into effect. The CBSA began the process of deporting him.

Deportation to the United States

He was deported to the US on 1 March 2015 and handed over to FBI agents at the Peace Bridge border crossing. He was housed at the Niagara County Jail, Lockport, New York, then transferred to a Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) private jail in northeast Ohio at Youngstown, then transferred to the Grady County Jail in Chickasha, Oklahoma; then transferred to another CCA private jail in Mason, Tennessee. On 23 Mar 2015 he was transferred back again to the Warren County Jail, Bowling Green, Kentucky, where he had already spent 21 months in pre-trial detention. He will remain there until the disposition of the US case against him.

On 11 June 2015 an Anonymous group arranged for supporters to send him gifts for his birthday in prison.

Plea and sentence

On November 13, 2015 in Tennessee, DeHart pleaded guilty to "two charges of receiving child pornography and a charge of failing to appear as ordered in court." On February 22, 2016, U.S. District Judge Aleta Arthur Trauger of the United States District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee sentenced DeHart to 72 months for the porn charges and an additional 18 months for fleeing the country.