Former eBay Exec Pleads Guilty to Cyber Stalking

A former government of eBay has pleaded guilty to taking element in a disturbing cyber stalking marketing campaign waged versus a married couple from Massachusetts.

The couple’s terrifying experience commenced soon after they wrote about eBay in an online publication aimed at eBay sellers, which they edited and printed. 

Below the marketing campaign, parcels with horrifying contents have been anonymously sent to the couple’s home in Natick about a period of weeks in 2019. The offers contained dwell spiders and cockroaches, a fetal pig, a bloodied pig mask, a wreath of funeral bouquets, and a guide on how to endure the dying of a husband or wife. 

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The marketing campaign bundled touring to Natick to surveil the victims and install a GPS monitoring system on their auto. The couple was also sent threatening private Twitter messages and targeted with Craigslist posts inviting the general public for sexual encounters at the victims’ household.

James Baugh, of San Jose, California, was 1 of seven senior eBay personnel billed around the cyberstalking campaign. The 47-yr-aged, who was used as eBay’s senior director of security and security when the marketing campaign was place in motion, was arrested alongside with David Harville, eBay’s previous Director of World Resiliency, in June 2020.

On Monday, Baugh pleaded guilty to one particular count of conspiracy to dedicate stalking through interstate journey and by services of interstate commerce, two counts of stalking via interstate journey, two counts of stalking by means of services of interstate commerce, two counts of witness tampering and two counts of destruction, alteration and falsification of documents in a federal investigation. 

Baugh’s co-conspirators and previous eBay staff Philip Cooke, Brian Gilbert, Stephanie Popp, Veronica Zea and Stephanie Stockwell previously pleaded guilty to involvement in the cyber-stalking marketing campaign. 

Courtroom documents stated the campaign was introduced after senior executives at eBay became frustrated with what they viewed as the critical tone and written content of the publication published by the few. 

Cooke was sentenced in July 2021 to 18 months in prison. Gilbert, Popp, Zea and Stockwell are awaiting sentencing. 

Harville, aged 50, is the only individual accused of taking part in the marketing campaign who has denied the costs. He pleaded not guilty and is awaiting trial.