I don't believe half the stuff the media is saying about him now. It was many years ago but my recollection of the story back then is mostly him breaking into the phone companies computer systems and opening telnet windows to communicate with their syspops. I pretty clearly remember him explaining to them how he got in and even how to fix it. Then weeks or months later he would get back into their system again, rinse and repeat. I don't remember him ever being accused of stealing or damaging anything. As I remember it he was so good that they just could not keep him out and when they finally caught him they sent him away for as long as they could to make an example out of him. I remember him telling about violent hardcore criminals getting less time than he got.