Six eBay employees including a former police captain in California last year engaged in a relentless campaign of harassment and cyberstalking of a Natick couple that published a newsletter critical of the online retailer, sending items including fly larvae, live spiders, and a bloody pig mask to their home and travelling to Massachusetts to conduct surveillance of the victims in an effort to get them to stop publishing, authorities alleged Monday.
During a news conference, US Attorney Andrew E. Lelling said the defendants conducted a “systematic campaign fueled by the resources of a Fortune 500 company to emotionally and psychologically terrorize this middle-aged couple in Natick."
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Lelling’s words were echoed by Joseph R. Bonavolonta, FBI special agent in charge of the bureau’s Boston office, who cited the suspects’ “elaborate and relentless campaign to stifle the publishers of an online newsletter out of fear that bad publicity would adversely impact” the company.
In a statement, eBay said it immediately launched a “comprehensive investigation" of the matter with outside legal counsel once law enforcement informed them of the alleged harassment in August 2019.
The statement quoted the independent committee formed by eBay’s board to oversee the internal review as saying that “eBay took these allegations very seriously from the outset. Upon learning of them, eBay moved quickly to investigate thoroughly and take appropriate action. The Company cooperated fully and extensively with law enforcement authorities throughout the process. eBay does not tolerate this kind of behavior. eBay apologizes to the affected individuals and is sorry that they were subjected to this. eBay holds its employees to high standards of conduct and ethics and will continue to take appropriate action to ensure these standards are followed."
Court papers identify the defendants as James Baugh, David Harville, Stephanie Popp, Brian Gilbert, Stephanie Stockwell, and Veronica Zea. Lelling said Baugh was arrested in New York. It wasn’t immediately clear when he’d make his initial appearance in US District Court in Boston.
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The remaining defendants, including Gilbert, the former police captain, weren’t yet in custody as of noontime Monday.
According to Lellling, the now-fired eBay officials also sent items including pornography to the couple’s neighbors in the couple’s names, posted listings on Craigslist urging swingers and couples to come to the Natick couples’ home to party every night after 10 pm, and created fake social media accounts to send messages to the couple including one that said, “do I have your attention now?”
A complaint filed in the case by FBI Special Agent Mark Wilson said the “campaign included: sending anonymous, threatening communications to the Victims; ordering unwanted and disturbing deliveries to their home, including funeral wreaths and books on surviving the loss of a spouse; and BAUGH, HARVILLE, Zea, and Popp travelling to Natick to surveil the Victims at their home and in their community.”
It wasn’t immediately clear if any of the suspects had retained lawyers to speak on their behalf.
According to the complaint, two eBay officials, identified in court papers only as Executive 1 and Executive 2, followed the couple’s newsletter with interest. In April 2019, Executive 2 told Executive 1 via text message, “We are going to crush this lady,” referring to the woman who put out the newsletter along with her husband, the complaint said.
Executive 2 also included a link in the text message to the newsletter’s coverage of Executive 1′s compensation, records show.
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The following month, the complaint said, Executive 2 texted Executive 1 again, writing that the newsletter’s coverage of eBay that day was " ‘Shockingly reasonable...’ Executive 1 replied, ‘I couldn’t care less what she says.’ Seconds later, Executive 1 added, ‘Take her down.’"
Around the same time, the complaint said, Baugh, eBay’s former senior director of safety and security, told Popp, Stockwell, a person identified as Analyst 1, and Zea during a meeting that eBay’s Global Intelligence Center would write an anonymous, threatening letter to Victim 1, the wife, to get her to stop publishing critical articles. The letter, which was supposed to be handwritten and sent from Austin so it couldn’t be tied to company, was never sent, officials said.
But on June 8, 2019, the filing said, Gilbert, at the time another security official at eBay, scribbled the word “Fidomaster” on the fence in front of the couple’s home. Fidomaster was a person who frequently posted criticism of eBay in the newsletter’s comment thread. Baugh also allegedly “remained convinced that Victim 2, or possibly Victim 1, was Fidomaster,” the filing said.
The complaint said Baugh also convened several meetings with Harville, Gilbert, Popp, Stockwell, and Zea, along with people identified as Supervisor 1, and Analysts 1, 2, and 3. During one meeting, the filing said, Baugh directed attendees to “anonymously harass Victims 1 and 2, with the goal of distracting Victim 1 and making her uncomfortable to the point where Victim 1 would stop writing negative articles about eBay. BAUGH called the harassment a ‘distraction campaign’ and suggested that scary masks, live insects, or embarrassing items, such as pornography and strippers, be sent to the Victims (and in some cases to their neighbors in the Victims’ names).”
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A cooperating witness told investigators Baugh at one point showed a clip from the movie Johnny Be Good in which characters engaged in similar conduct, records show.
“BAUGH stated he wanted something similar to happen to the Victims and tasked the [intelligence center’s] members with brainstorming other things that could be delivered to the Victims’ home,” the filing said.
He also allegedly directed that the deliveries not be traceable to eBay.
“At his direction, Zea and other [intelligence center] analysts paid for the deliveries using prepaid debit cards, and made online orders using anonymous email accounts, virtual private networks,6 and cell phones and computers specifically purchased for the harassment campaign,” the filing said.
This is a breaking news story that will be updated.
Travis Andersen can be reached at travis.andersen@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @TAGlobe.
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'We are going to crush this lady’: Six former eBay employees charged in federal cyberstalking case targeting Natick couple - The Boston Globe
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