Sorry - if the guy was controlling a botnet, he can do his time just based on the massive numbers of computers he was illegal controlling.

Sure we might feel some underdog sympathy for wikileaks right now, but the people doing these ddos attacks are the exact same people who ddos other sites and cost a ton of money every year. No free pass - civil disobedience is not free of consequences, and nobody should seriously suggest that launching a DDOS against a major corporation is "fair"