Yesterday, new court documents surfaced in the civil lawsuit against PS3 hacker George “GeoHot” Hotz, which accused him of both fleeing to South America and tampering with hard drive evidence he had been ordered to turn over for examination. Hotz denied those claims on his personal blog in the snarky tone he’s known for, but today official statements from one of Hotz’s attorneys has surfaced further explaining the situation.
Defense attorney Stewart Kellar backs up Hotz’s claims that he is merely on vacation and is not trying to run from the charges against him.
"The notion that George has fled the country is absurd,” Kellar told Ars Technica. “George is in South America to see a friend, on a trip he planned before this lawsuit ever began. George has had to make himself available 24/7 for this litigation, which has been quite demanding on him."
Kellar also claims that Sony is intentionally misleading the court with their claims of evidence tampering in order to make Hotz look bad.
"SCEA's (Sony Consumer Entertainment America) lawyers are using intentionally ambiguous language so that the public, and the Court, might assume the worst,” Kellar explains. ”The components' SCEA is talking about are hard drives' controller cards. The neutral [third party which is examining the equipment Hotz was ordered to surrender] subsequently had to explain to SCEA the form and function of hard drive controller cards. It is a stock part that can be purchased at any electronics hardware store. Those controller cards have since been provided to the neutral so the point is moot."
And even though Hotz may inject his brand of humor into this case once in a while, Kellar says he actually taking it all quite seriously.
“You have to remember that Mr. Hotz didn't choose to fight this battle, but now that he has been sued, he has put his heart into fighting this case that has enormous implications for consumers world-wide," Kellar stated. "The question of whether a consumer truly 'owns' that system he or she purchased from the store is prevalent in all of this."
The motion filed by Sony’s legal team lists the next scheduled hearing in this case as April 8th 2011. It will certainly be interesting to hear what Judge Susan Illston will have to say about all of this drama.
