January 18, 1990, University of Missouri pre-law student Craig Neidorf was visited by a U.S. Secret Service agent and a BellSouth Security representative. This visit concerned an E911 (Enhanced 911) emergency system, which appeared heavily revised in Issue 24 of Phrack. Phrack is an electronic magazine which Nedorf published. During this visit Neidorf was quick to cooperate and answered all the question that they presented. The next day, the same visitors returned, confronting him with a search warrant.
January 29, 1990, Neidorf and his attorney ventured into the U.S. Attorney's office in Chicago. A more broader line of questioning commenced and once again hi willingly answered.
February 1, 1990 a grand jury indicted Neidorf with six counts including wire fraud, computer fraud, and transportation of stolen property worth over $5,000.
June, 1990, the grand jury dropped the computer fraud charges and added more wire fraud charges. Neidorf now faced ten felony charge. The maximum penalty totaled to 65 years in prison.
July 23, 1990, the trial began in Chicago's District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. The arsenal of "truth" the prosecution had withheld included witnesses, the Secret Service agent, Robert Riggs (who was a friend of Neidorf being accused of conspiring with Neidorf), and many employees of BellSouth. The prosecution's four main pieces of evidence included the E911 file that appeared in Phrack, that was supposed to be hacking instructions, a Trojan Horse program, and an announcement in Phrack of "The Phoenix Project", which included a statement saying, "Knowledge is the key to the future and is FREE"(Denning 616)
When presented in court, it became clear, that Phrack version of E911 file was not presented in a way that could be useful for hacking. It was also shown, through Robert Rigg's testimony, that BellSouth cared little enough about protecting this file far it to be considered very sensitive. Riggs used an account without a password to "break-ins" to their system.
The three articles appearing in Phrack which were considered threatening enough to motivate one count of indictment, for conspiring to steal property and Publish stolen documents, were also disproves by Riggs testimony.
The Trojan Horse Login Program evidence approached by the prosecution was also disproves. Not only did Neidorf follow acceptable procedures of inquiry on the file, his ownership of this program provided no intent of criminal activity, and his programing is commonly understood, as far as construction and usage within the computer science realm.
Finally, "The Phoenix Project," which the government believed to be a large conspiracy of publishing stolen info. was provided to be no longer a danger. At a Summer Conference in 1988, in St. Louis, where the "new age" was supposed to begin. The Secret Service observed the meeting with about 15 hours video tape and discovered nothing significant, concerning security intrusion.
On the Friday, of the week, of the trial, the government declared a mistrial,
undoubtedly for fear of public humiliation. Craig Neidorf unfortunately was
left with a $100,000 court bill.
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