Cody WIlson v State Department

I wonder if he will tell his cell mates that he is a big deal.

One thing is for sure. He is not getting out on bail.

From Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/Defense_Distributed/comments/9hrq6l/future_of_defense_distributed/e6ebs48


This is from the designer of the Liberator and of the original Ghost Gunner.

he following statements are mine and mine alone. They do not reflect CRW's thoughts/opinions/actions. This is not an official statement from Defense Distributed and/or any of its subsidiaries. I am offering this personal statement as a reassurance that Ghost Gunner and its related products are not legally connected to CRW's present legal difficulties. I will not answer questions related to CRW's present situation, as that is not the point of this statement. My goal is to reassure you - our customers - that GhostGunner's future is not immediately in jeopardy.Who am I?
I have been DD's primary engineer since 2013. Specifically, I designed most of our 3DP creations (including Liberator). I am GhostGunner's primary designer. Specifically, if you purchased a GG more than two years ago, then every single design aspect of that machine - except for the DDcut software executable AND the initial (opensource) grbl firmware (which I modified for GG) - was my creation. Since then, we've had other people design certain aspects, primarily because I took an extended break from DD after burning myself out designing and shipping the original machine. I am forever grateful for the others who took over maintaining GG in my absence (I was available for critical issues (e.g. redesigning GG's spindle)). I reveal this information not to brag, but to answer OP's concerns about DD's future. From a technological perspective, we will still be able to create products. It helps that Cody and I share each others' vision, so I believe we can continue to disrupt in his absence.
I know Cody well and talked with him nearly every day (three times yesterday). In regards to "DD's future", Cody is the visionary and a brilliant agitator. The risk that I go to prison due to anything DD has done are 0%; Cody and I were always very careful to make sure that anything legally uncertain was always done with his neck on the line. So I'm not going anywhere.
I won't go into too much detail on the financials, but I will point out that all donations y'all made during last month's fundraising drive went directly to the Second Amendment Foundation; neither DD nor CRW touched a single dollar. We did this to maximize your donations; for political reasons, DD has had a difficult time maintaining our tax exempt status, whereas the SAF has a much easier time not paying any tax on your donations... for that reason they got the money directly, as they are also a plaintiff. In short, any dollar you donated will be used to support our 1st and 2nd amendment cases. A few of y'all noted that when y'all previously asked "I thought I was donating to DD, but the receipt says SAF. Why is that?" Purchase y'all made for patches/USB drives/any physical object went directly to our bank account, which we retain access to.
We have operated without Cody's presence for long periods in the past. While these allegations are generating a media frenzy, I can assure y'all that it's business as usual for the most part. We are getting quite a few more phone calls than normal, and the press has tried really hard to come inside, but at the moment all business components related to Ghost Gunner are running 100%.
If Cody is tried, sentenced, and ends up in prison, then we'll certainly lose "the same edginess about [our] brand," but from a technological/product pipeline/production/fulfillment standpoint, we are very well capable of continuing to function. In fact, we just hired a new engineer on Monday (who is a bit confused at the moment, but is still coming to work).
You must know that Cody and I have long understood that he might end up in prison (although I didn't think it would be under these circumstances), so rest assured we had a plan for when yesterday finally arrived.
Thank you for your support. We will issue an official statement as soon as such statement doesn't incur any legal obligations.

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Summarized Timeline (Live Updates):

Allegedly, Cody Wilson contacted someone (now known to be a 16 year old girl) on 'SugarDaddyMeet.com', an 18+ website.

August 15th, 2018 they arranged to meet and drove to a hotel in Austin using a Defense Distributed company vehicle. They went inside the hotel and had sex. Afterwards Cody gave her $500. Surveillance video evidence confirms their locations throughout the evening.

August 16th, Cody emptied more than 60 bitcoin accounts with five transactions totaling $986,525, SPLC reported on 9/20. Still waiting on others to confirm.

August 20th, 2 week 'Defense (Contributed)' fundraising campaign is announced.

August 22nd, Austin PD responded to a call from a counselor that had spoke with the girl. Austin Police reported that a friend of the 16 year old told Cody Wilson that he was under police investigation.

August 23rd Live Stream, Cody is asked if he is afraid of a similar fate as Ross Ulbricht.

August 28th, DEFCAD relaunches to sell 3D blueprints.

August 31st, Cody emptied the 8/16 BTC account and moved the funds to a new account, 1Q6B2, where they still sit, SPLC reported on 9/20. Still waiting on others to confirm.

September 3rd, 'Defense (Contributed)' fundraising campaign concludes.

September 4th Podcast, "I'm about to get owned probably, personally, but I'll wait for the news to break."

September 5th, Cody departs LAX for Taiwan.

September 6th, Cody arrived in Taiwan.

September 7th, Cody checked out of a hotel in Taipei 1 day early.

September 19th, Cody is charged with sexual assault in Austin, Texas.

September 19th, Cody spotted in Taipei City trying to sign a lease for a small room in downtown Taipei. Reportedly paid rent and deposit. Rental agency tipped off authorities after realizing who he was. | Surveillance video at rental agency.

September 21st, Apartment lease was set to start. Check-in time already passed.

September 21st, Report on /r/taiwan of plainclothes police requesting IDs from white males in Taipei. | archive

Guy's a douche and not 2a friendly. Felt that way ever since he sensationalized the Ghost Gun mill...

Ranchero50 said:

Guy's a douche and not 2a friendly. Felt that way ever since he sensationalized the Ghost Gun mill...

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He may be a douche, but can you explain why you think he's not 2A friendly?

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk

I wonder if that is why Wilson wanted bitcoin's?

Wilson be damned but I hope that SAF and Defense Distributed continue forward with the case...

Inigoes said:

I wonder if that is why Wilson wanted bitcoin's?

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None of the money recently donated in the recent fundraiser went to him or DD. All of it went to the Second Amendment Foundation, which is the co-plaintiff in the big lawsuit from WA and is suing back at a few of the states and their AGs that sued DD.

As indicated in my post above, DD will continue on without him, if necessary.

Cody had been saving Bitcoin since 2012. Loaded.

DC-W said:

From Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/Defense_Distributed/comments/9hrq6l/future_of_defense_distributed/e6ebs48


This is from the designer of the Liberator and of the original Ghost Gunner.

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I am happy to hear that DD can and will continue on.

https://twitter.com/defdist/status/1043958734102224897?s=21

Defense Distributed

Press conference this Tuesday at 11 a.m. Location TBA. See you soon.

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That’s probably CT, so 12pm here

whistlersmother said:

He may be a douche, but can you explain why you think he's not 2A friendly?

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk

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Because when you rub someone's nose in shit they'll dislike the smell and resent you. Home built firearms weren't an issue until he made them one. For hyping the ghost gun phenomenon so he can sell very limited value mini mills I hope he rots in Hell.

He purposely rubbed the grabbers noses in ghost gun shit which resulted in more legislation that does nothing to prevent crime, only hurt law abiding citizens.

He created this problem, thus he is not 2a friendly.

Ranchero50 said:

Because when you rub someone's nose in shit they'll dislike the smell and resent you. Home built firearms weren't an issue until he made them one. For hyping the ghost gun phenomenon so he can sell very limited value mini mills I hope he rots in Hell.

He purposely rubbed the grabbers noses in ghost gun shit which resulted in more legislation that does nothing to prevent crime, only hurt law abiding citizens.

He created this problem, thus he is not 2a friendly.

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I kinda feel that way too. Let sleeping dogs lie.

Ranchero50 said:

Because when you rub someone's nose in shit they'll dislike the smell and resent you. Home built firearms weren't an issue until he made them one. For hyping the ghost gun phenomenon so he can sell very limited value mini mills I hope he rots in Hell.

He purposely rubbed the grabbers noses in ghost gun shit which resulted in more legislation that does nothing to prevent crime, only hurt law abiding citizens.

He created this problem, thus he is not 2a friendly.

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Okay, fair enough.

But I'll say this - the grabbers will grab regardless if they get their nose rubbed in shit or not.

whistlersmother said:

Okay, fair enough.

But I'll say this - the grabbers will grab regardless if they get their nose rubbed in shit or not.

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I kinda feel that way too.

Released on bond. If nothing has changed from the charging documents, he’s wearing an ankle bracelet and his passport surrendered, even though it’s already been invalidated.
https://www.khou.com/video/news/loc...-released-from-harris-county-jail/285-8260581

gprimr1 said:

So there might be some unpopular thoughts in this.

First, if he had child porn on his computer, he should be in jail. That is wrong.

Second, he did ultimately sleep with someone under the age of consent. I think that ultimately, anyone can lie and join the website, and the onus is on the person to ensure that the person is legal. I'm not going to fault him for using the website, I think everyone knows that I think that if two consenting adults want to exchange money for sex, it's none of the government's business. That wasn't the case here though.

Now, I have some problems with this case. It sounds like the girl freely took and send nude images of herself. That should be enough to have her arrested and charged. The one article suggests that she contacted him, not the other way around. Since you can't register for websites like those without being over 18, she would have had to lie about her age and thus misrepresent herself and try to profit from her fraud.

I feel for those women who are forced to do sex work, who are sold into sex work, and the people who do that should be shot on site; but this girl doesn't sound like she was pimped or trafficked, it sounds like she knew what she was doing.

Cody broke the law, he should have ensured she was over 18 before he paid to play, but it will be sad if this girl doesn't get in trouble too.

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This article is hard to load, keep trying.
https://www.researchgate.net/profil...ornography/links/0912f505a201003411000000.pdf

I have no problems with saying Cody was a idiot in this case.

In the case presented to the judge the arrest warrant was based on the girl *LOOKING* underage. This is illegal as a basis of suspicion. Look up little lupe.

It was also based on video footage of her entering the hotel, etc. So the help w geometry homework defense? He said, she said. Wonder if she knows any friends of David Hogg"... Especially after she discovered what a "Big Deal"" he was? Still pretty damning.

OK, third point of the warrant was her cell phone texts, info that the cops would not confirm. Meaning they have nothing admitting she was underage.

Then he was tipped off by a friend of hers, so I guess a member of the same sugar daddy site he also knew?

And then there was the US GVMT canceling his passport to circumvent non extradition treaties. This whole thing stinks!

I think Cody is a hero, trying to reverse over a century of US fascist, gun control.

Ranchero50 said:

Because when you rub someone's nose in shit they'll dislike the smell and resent you. Home built firearms weren't an issue until he made them one. For hyping the ghost gun phenomenon so he can sell very limited value mini mills I hope he rots in Hell.

He purposely rubbed the grabbers noses in ghost gun shit which resulted in more legislation that does nothing to prevent crime, only hurt law abiding citizens.

He created this problem, thus he is not 2a friendly.

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The same could be said of Heller, Wrenn, and Mathew Grace. All of them can be said to have been "creating a problem."
They rubbed the gun grabbers nose in shit, forced an issue and won. The fact is that the gun control nuts have been attacking the idea of 3d (build up) and CNC (mill down) code outside of anything Wilson did. Beneficial case law is very often made by gadfly's who are "making an issue."

I am an NRA supporter, I think overall we would be in trouble without the NRA, but are you forgetting NRA did NOTHING to help in Heller? They thought Heller was not worthwhile and too provocative also.


In terms of the other issue, the charges, to me the question will come down to a) what exact child pornography he had on his computer, how it got there, from what site, etc. and b) in terms of the actual act, meeting this 16 year old and having sexual contract with here the case law on how an adult knows the age of a minor is all over the place. And c) did he solicit a minor.

On "a" if the child pornography is profile and other pictures from a site that represents itself as adults only site, which in theory has some controls, and is not clearly a child, then this is in a gray area. I cant find any info if he was for example running searches for child pornography, had material that was clearly minors, had some kind of collection that showed a [pattern, which would be way more damning. I'd want him locked up and key thrown away if he was.

I can for example send you an email with material to which someone else has copyright rights, a landscape photo someone else has copyright to, several pages from a book, and you have on your computer material which violates copyright,. You do even if you delete it without emptying cache/recycle bin. if Wilson have a number of them, folders that are organized or there is some evidence he tried to hide them then this goes more to likely guilt.

In terms of "b", Wilson is not an 18 or 21-year-old meeting a girl who under the age of consent ( 16,17,18 as state laws vary, 18 in texas) and represents herself as 18. He is much older and even if she represents as 18, I would think the burden is on him having some kind of reasonable effort or circumstance creating a strong evidence based belief that she is 18 or older. In other words his defense would need to be affirmative: if a) she is under 18 and b) he had sexual contract with her, a strong evidence based belief that she was over 18 could be mitigating or even a not guilty, but he would and should have to prove some compelling and reasonable to other people strong belief she was above the age of consent.

Thirdly this case may involve solicitation to prostitution of a minor which does and (and certainly should) compound the crime.

So the answer is Wilson has not responded to the charges. The only thing we know he is that he effectively fled. he is entitle to respond, and to defend himself thorough the judicial process. But it does look pretty bad. I haven't made my mind up but unless he presents some clear evidence he has been set up or these charges have no evidence behind them, as the father of several young daughters, I won't support him in word or thought.


Lastly what this should mean for us as Second Amendment supporters is nothing. The other side will make a huge deal of it. They are temporarily distracted with the scotus nomination. But we should be ready with counter arguments. Not counter arguments to his guilt or innocence or conspiracy theories about that, but counter arguments to relevance of a single actor: Did Everytown give up when their top state legislator -- Leeland Yee -- whom they supported, celebrated, lauded and funded to the tune of millions as the most effective legislator pushing gun control, got caught illegally and systematically gun running to gangs and terrorist method using criminal organizations ? No they just scrubbed his name from a dozen gun control lobby websites. Did Bloomberg give up when his "mayors against gun violence" turn out to include, at much higher than average rates, mayors who themselves were criminals, violent wife abusers, carriers of illegal guns? No he just rebranded that group.

rascal said:

The same could be said of Heller, Wrenn, and Mathew Grace. All of them can be said to have been "creating a problem."
They rubbed the gun grabbers nose in shit, forced an issue and won. The fact is that the gun control nuts have been attacking the idea of 3d (build up) and CNC (mill down) code outside of anything Wilson did. Beneficial case law is very often made by gadfly's who are "making an issue."

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The difference being the current political climate makes his decision to make it an issue far worse. The law already said it's OK to build your own gun as long as you are legally able to own one. His timing sucks and there was nothing to be gained by poking the bear about it. It was just a rah rah rah we're sticking it to the man publicity campaign to sell his mills that's backfiring with a vengeance.

Ghost Gunner won't issue a refund on the deposit for their GG2 machine. Also won't give me an ETA.

I don't trust them, so I'm just going to cut my losses on the $250.00. I don't trust them with an additional $1850.00 of my money.