Six former eBay executives and employees have been charged with cyberstalking after allegedly harassing a couple who was critical of the company in a blog.
Last year, EBay’s then-Chief Executive Officer Devin Wenig fired off texts to a colleague expressing his ire over unflattering coverage by a blogger of his oversight of the e-commerce site. What followed, prosecutors said, was a criminal scheme by his underlings to cyber-stalk the couple behind the online newsletter.
Wenig isn’t charged in the case, but two former top EBay security executives and four other ex-employees were. While there’s no suggestion in court papers that Wenig knew of the plot, prosecutors say his angry emails triggered the scheme, and they play a central role in the narrative spelled out by the government.
Federal prosecutors claim James Baugh and David Harville led the elaborate harassment campaign, which allegedly included sending live cockroaches and a funeral wreath to the Massachusetts couple that publishes the newsletter. The ex-EBay employees also tried to place a GPS tracker on a vehicle belonging to the couple and sent them a bloody pig Halloween mask and a book on surviving the death of a spouse, according to the FBI.
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