So going back to the ATM hacking example, do you think that's criminal or not? What if it's not a "regulated" institution, like an ordinary business? Say you scam Acme Co out of a few million dollars. Luckily for society, Acme Co is a trillion dollar company, so they could stand to lose that. The only harm is to its margins and shareholders, like you said earlier. Does that mean it's fine to hack Acme Co, worst case scenario I have to repay what I stole, and maybe pay their lawyer/cleanup costs?

If you can't clearly articulate what the "public interest" means, it just feels like this whole thing is just a long winded way for you to say that we shouldn't be prosecuting non-violent crimes, unless the victim is sufficiently sympathetic, in which case we throw the book at them. That's no way to run a justice system.

>Can you offer a positive moral argument for incarceration in this case? Surely you are aware of principles around the burden of proof? Since you seem to be on the pro criminal prosecution side here why don't you take up the burden of saying you want this man to suffer in prison for his crime? I understand your frustration that I don't have all the answers. It would be a more impressive indictment if I was willing to send people to prison under such circumstances.

You can make the same arguments about the questionable utility of incarceration for violent crimes too. The typical arguments against incarceration works equally well for violent crimes as they do for non-violent ones.

Yeah, I think they are arguing that white collar crimes should not result in prison sentences.