Looks like he has a really heavy fine and up to 5 years in jail coming his way. It's a shame, really. Just take your lumps on the exam, it's certainly better than this.
Sure it's better than this. But most likely, he didn't think they'd correlate his Tor activity so it may have been "better" for him personally if he had gotten away with it.
It seems as though he was not thinking rationally. He used both Tor and Guerrilla Mail, but did not consider sending the messages from a public WiFi hotspot? Seems like a really rookie mistake to make if you are going to commit a federal offense.
To be fair, sending from a public WiFi spot is relatively benign in general. From released data, it's only because he was on campus that they caught him. If he had done it from a random McDonalds in New Jersey, he'd have been fine.
And, for all we know, if he simply didn't say anything, he'd have been OK, too. The only evidence in the affidavit besides his confession is "he used Tor".
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1038
Looks like he has a really heavy fine and up to 5 years in jail coming his way. It's a shame, really. Just take your lumps on the exam, it's certainly better than this.