3-year term for Seattle man who stole identities online

Frederick Eugene Wood once was a promising medical student, before the methamphetamine took over. Then he became an HIV-infected addict who used his smarts as a computer hacker and identity thief.

Tuesday, a federal judge in Seattle sentenced the 34-year-old Seattle man to more than three years in prison for using peer-to-peer file-sharing networks to invade unsuspecting people's computers, steal their financial information and use it to buy items online that he would then sell on Craigslist.

"Breaking into people's computers is just like breaking into people's houses," Wood told U.S. District Judge James Robart. "I realize now that it's wrong."

Wood was caught in November 2007 after a Seattle man answered an ad on Craigslist for a new Macintosh laptop. The man met with Wood, who called himself Ken, and gave him $1,500 for the computer, still sealed in the box.

When the man got home, he opened the box to find that it contained only an old flower vase and a book.

Using a different name, the man then e-mailed "Ken" and arranged to buy another computer from him. But when he went to make the deal this time, he took along the Seattle police, who arrested Wood.

A detective then seized Wood's computer and found evidence that he had been using LimeWire, a peer-to-peer file-sharing system, to poke around in strangers' computers all over the country and steal their tax returns and other sensitive financial information.

Wood would use the information to get credit cards and bank accounts in the victims' names. Then he would buy items to sell, but he usually just gave the buyers worthless junk in the boxes.

Police also learned that Wood was friends with Gregory Kopiloff, a Seattle man who was sentenced to more than four years in federal prison last year for also using LimeWire to rip people off.

In court Tuesday, Assistant U.S. Attorney Kathryn Warma said Wood's "egregious and devious" actions exploited not only people's computers, but their ignorance of how vulnerable file-sharing programs can make them.

Warma said the government has tallied 13 people who lost money to Wood's hacking, to the tune of $25,713.

Wood stood to tell the judge that he was sorry, and that drug addiction had ruined his life. He said he hoped prison drug treatment would help him come back to society as a productive person.

"One thing I wish more than anything else is that I could look the victims in the face and apologize to them to their face," he said.

Robart said he had his doubts, because Wood has failed drug treatment three times and has shown a history of being manipulative.

"This is not a victimless crime," Robart said.

But the judge also said he hopes there is a lesson for would-be victims who read this story in the newspaper.

"Perhaps others will learn not to buy computers-in-a-box on Craigslist that turn out to be rocks," he said.

Ian Ith: 206-464-2109 or iith@seattletimes.com