Matt DeHart

Matt Paul DeHart (born June 11, 1984) is an American citizen and former U.S. Air National Guard intelligence analyst and a registered sex offender. and spent 21 months in prison while awaiting trial. After being released on bail in 2012, he unsuccessfully sought asylum in Canada, claiming he had been tortured by the FBI with regards to the classified documents. In November 2015 he struck a plea bargain to serve a -year sentence. He took classes through Corning Community College; 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.

Timeline of events

Receipt of documents

DeHart was involved in online activities with a small group 'Anonymous Anti-Security' using the anonymity network Tor.

DeHart claimed the "document dropped onto his Tor server included details of FBI's investigation into CIA's possible role in the anthrax attack". DeHart said the CIA staged the attacks to draw the US into a war with Iraq. 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".

After an unsuccessful attempt to seek asylum in Canada, he was deported to the US on March 1, 2015, and handed over to FBI agents at the Peace Bridge border crossing.

Plea and sentence

DeHart was described by one prosecutor as a "classic child sex predator". On February 22, 2016, U.S. District Court 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. According to DeHart, he was originally scheduled to be released September 11, 2018, taking into account the 14 months he had spent under house arrest in Canada; this part of his plea deal was not honored, and he was eventually released from prison in October 2019.

DeHart has claimed wrongful prosecution, accusing the U.S. government of using child pornography as a ruse to probe his activist activities.

In 2017, his mother stated that he would "be on a sex offender's registry for 10 years". Although his conviction is in Tennessee, because his last known address was in Concord, New Hampshire, he was also required to register there as a sex offender, with a mugshot dated June 14, 2021.