Gonzalez sentenced to concurrent 20-years terms; one more sentencing to go

Nancy Weil reports:

As his parents and sister silently wept, hacker mastermind Albert Gonzalez was sentenced Thursday in U.S. District Court to two concurrent 20-year stints in prison for his role in what prosecutors called the “unparalleled” theft of millions of credit and debit card numbers from major U.S. retailers.*

U.S. District Court Judge Patti B. Saris announced the concurrent sentences in two 2008 cases against Gonzalez, 28, a Cuban-American born in Miami, where he lived when the crimes were committed. According to binding terms of a plea agreement Gonzalez forged with the U.S. Department of Justice, he could have received between 15 years and 25 years for the crimes.

[…]

…. the issue of restitution was set aside for a separate hearing on June 25, to give the DOJ and others involved in the case time to come up with a total figure. Judge Saris said that she is likely to have to determine an amount of restitution and then leave the rest of the damages companies hope to recover to lawsuits. Heartland has already agreed to multimillion-dollar settlements with Visa and American Express for damages in the hacking thefts.