He does have a good heart, but, I dont know, he just wants to make those who disagree with him suffer, Rose Collins said in a telephone interview from her home outside Austin, Texas. He thinks America is evil, has done everything wrong. That made for some tension in the family. Collins described herself as a staunch conservative who has attended Tea Party rallies. Hammonds father, now jailed in a Chicago suburb awaiting trial on a charge of aggravated sexual abuse of a minor, was very, very far left, Collins said. So far off the charts that one more step hes going to fall off the planet.
Hammond, she said, was raised by his father after the couple split up and then adopted his politics. He wants to end capitalism, she said. Collins said her son could have done anything with his computer skills but had a penchant for using them to raise a ruckus. In high school, she said, he hacked into the schools mainframe computer to demonstrate its security vulnerabilities. He did the same thing when he went to college at the University of Illinois at Chicago, which earned him an expulsion, she said.
The university confirmed that Hammond was a computer science major but left without a degree in 2004. A year later, Hammond was caught hacking into a conservative website and stealing credit card information. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to two years in prison. Collins said she hopes her son is innocent. Im praying for that, she said. But she added that she has long admired his courage and passion for his political beliefs, even if she didnt share them. Hes a braver man than me, she said. Hammond is now jailed pending transport to New York, where he will face charges.
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