Teens help capture hacker who wanted nude photos
John Torres, Florida Today
BREVARD COUNTY — An Irish-born computer hacker, working on a U.S. military base in Baghdad, used elaborate computer-hacking methods, personal information and direct threats against four Brevard County teenage girls because he wanted nude photos of them, according to documents filed in U.S. District Court in Orlando.
Some of the victims complied by sending pictures of themselves naked or in states of undress.
After a five-year investigation, FBI agents arrested Patrick Connolly on Friday in Atlanta on one count of computer hacking. He faces more charges, and is expected to be transferred to Orlando shortly.
Court documents describe seven victims in the case -- six who live in Florida.
But authorities said he contacted teenage girls around the world beginning in 2005.
"He's facing some very serious charges," said Steve Cole, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office.
According to the documents:
Connolly started harassing a 14-year-old Rockledge girl in 2005, after hacking into her computer and contacting her using an instant-messaging service on America Online.
Using the screen name "Cucumbersn7," he instructed the girl to take a picture of herself taking a shower. He then sent her proof that he knew her home address.
She sent a photo with clothes on, but he persisted, and then threatened to harm the girl's sister.
The victim told authorities that she did not want to worry her pregnant mother, so she sent 10 photos of herself naked. She then stayed off the Internet for a long time.
However, when she finally went back online, Connolly found her again. He demanded more photos, and when the girl declined, he created a MySpace page featuring the previous photos she had sent him.
The second victim was a 17-year-old Rockledge girl who was contacted in a similar fashion in 2005, the documents allege.
"He claimed to know everything about (victim 2), and typed her home address and telephone number into his chats to prove it," FBI agent Nikolas Savage wrote in his affidavit. He "demanded revealing photographs from (victim 2), and threatened to make her the 'most well-known-girl at school' if she did not provide them."
That October, the girl's parents gave the FBI permission to assume the daughter's online persona to try to catch him.
What followed was an intricate cat-and-mouse game that involved high-tech computer hacking, more than 50 screen names, multiple computers and tracking software that tracked communications through several countries.
Connolly embedded programs into the computers, which gave him remote control of the computers, and allowed him to look at photos and read files belonging to the teenage girls, according to the complaint.
At various times, Connolly deleted permanent files on the computer of a second teenage girl for refusing to send suggestive images, and warned he would send explicit Webcam images made by a third teenage girl to her grandmother if she didn't take more photos of herself, according to the criminal complaint.
One of the first cracks in the case was when Connolly contacted a 14-year-old Melbourne girl on Feb. 22, 2007, and told her to answer the phone.
She did not answer, but wrote down the phone number -- traced to a cell phone with a Saudi Arabian exchange.
As agents moved closer to finding Connolly, they received cooperation from a former alleged accomplice -- Ivory Dickerson of Seven Lakes, N.C. -- who later was sentenced to 110 years in prison for manufacturing child pornography and possessing child pornography.
Still, Connolly continued to elude authorities.
Finally, after investigating him for five years, FBI agents were put back on Connolly's trail two months ago, when he contacted via Facebook one of the teenage girls he had harassed years earlier.
According to the complaint, Connolly created a Facebook profile, and immediately searched for the names of the teenage girls he had threatened years earlier.
The complaint also alleges that in 2004, Connolly showed up at the Orlando workplace of an Orlando teenager who was 16 at the time. He wanted to take her to the Universal Studios theme park, the criminal complaint said. She refused.
According to the documents, the other Brevard County victim also was from Rockledge, and a Miami teen, also victimized, used to live in Rockledge as well.
The criminal complaint said Connolly worked in Baghdad for Tennessee-based EOD Technology Inc., a U.S. Department of Defense contractor. But a spokesman said he no longer was a contract employee with the company.
William Pearse, a company vice president, said EOD Technology officials cooperated with authorities.
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