The former University of Michigan assistant football coach accused of hacking the email, social media and cloud storage accounts of thousands of female athletes from across the country and downloading their intimate photos and videos asked a federal judge on Tuesday to throw out half of the case, arguing that the government is trying to “turbocharge punishments for routine computer trespass."
Matthew Weiss, who spent 12 years in the NFL and was an offensive coordinator for one of college football’s most prestigious programs, was fired from the University of Michigan in 2023. He was indicted and pleaded not guilty in March to multiple counts of unauthorized computer access and multiple counts of aggravated identity theft that, together, carry a maximum sentence of nine decades in prison.
Weiss' defense accused federal prosecutors in Detroit of “overreach” by overcharging routine hacking as aggravated identity theft, so Weiss might potentially receive a stiffer sentence.
“The government’s effort to transform computer trespass into aggravated identity theft must fail,” defense attorneys said in their motion to dismiss. “Congress has created a careful framework for how to punish computer hacking, and the government’s novel theory conflicts with Congress’s design.”
"This case should instead proceed as Congress intended: As a prosecution under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, not the Aggravated Identity Theft statute," the motion continued.
Prosecutors claim that Weiss, 42, gained unauthorized access to student athlete databases of more than 100 colleges and universities that were maintained by a third-party vendor and allegedly downloaded the personally identifiable information and medical data of more than 150,000 athletes. According to the indictment, Weiss was then able to access the social media, email, and cloud storage accounts of more than 2,000 target athletes and subsequently downloaded personal, intimate digital photographs and videos that were never intended to be shared beyond intimate partners.
Weiss is also accused of illegally accessing info on 1,300 additional students, according to the indictment.
The allegations date to 2015, at which time Weiss was an assistant coach for the NFL's Baltimore Ravens, and continued through 2023 while he was coaching at Michigan, according to the indictment.
A federal class-action lawsuit subsequently filed on behalf of anonymous plaintiffs said to be affected by Weiss' alleged actions claims that officials at the University of Michigan, as well as then-football coach Jim Harbaugh, learned of Weiss' hacking in 2022 prior to a playoff game and failed to take any action to address it.
Harbaugh said in March after Weiss was indicted that he was "completely shocked" by the allegations and that he didn't learn of them until after Weiss had coached his final game in 2022.
ABC News sent a request for comment in June to University of Michigan officials, Weiss, Harbaugh, and the NFL's Los Angeles Chargers, for which Harbaugh is now the head coach, and did not receive a response.
The defense criticized the government’s view of the case, which, they argued, is that entering login credentials to access another person’s account triggers the two-year minimum punishment mandated by the aggravated identity theft statute.
“Instead of entering login credentials and then viewing information in an account being a mostly probation offense, suddenly a two-year mandatory minimum penalty for each act of hacking applies,” the defense said, in part. “Counsel are aware of no court decision ever accepting this theory.”
Prosecutors have not yet responded to the defense motion.