The 20-year prison sentence imposed on hacker Albert Gonzalez by the US District Court Judge Douglas P. Woodlock on Friday, March 26, will run concurrently with the 20-year sentence that the 28-year-old cyber-criminal received on March 25 in two other cases - a sentence that was imposed by Judge Patti B. Saris in the US District Court for the District of Massachusetts.

With the concomitant running of the two sentences implies that Gonzalez – who was part of a hacking ring that compromised computer networks of Heartland Payment Systems – means that the hacker will serve a sentence of at least 20 years.

The Heartland Payment Systems’ computers, which Gonzalez and his cybercrime ring hacked, basically processed credit and debit card transactions for Visa and American Express, 7-Eleven stores, and Hannaford Supermarkets. Other than Heartland, Gonzalez and his gang were also associated with hacks against some other retailers including BJ’s Wholesale Club, TJX, and OfficeMax.

While imposing the sentence, Judge Woodlock took into account the fact that when Gonzalez joined the cybercrime ring; he was on pre-trial release for an unrelated crime. At the time, he was officially serving as an informant for the US Secret Service, but he passed on the information obtained as a part of the investigations to a co-conspirator.

Pleading for leniency, Gonzalez said at the sentencing: “I am guilty of these crimes ... I accept full responsibility for these actions.”