Parkville Man Sentenced for Computer Hacking, Accessing Child Pornography

KANSAS CITY, Mo. – Tom Larson, Acting United States Attorney for the Western District of Missouri, announced that a Parkville, Mo., man who was under investigation for hacking into his former employer’s computer system, was sentenced in federal court today for both the intrusion charge and for using a computer to view thousands of images of child pornography.

Jacob Raines, 38, of Parkville, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Howard F. Sachs to six years in federal prison without parole.

On May 23, 2017, Raines pleaded guilty to one count of computer intrusion and one count of accessing a computer in order to view child pornography over the Internet.

Raines worked as the information technology manager for American Crane & Tractor Parts in Kansas City, Kan., from July 2004 until his resignation on March 28, 2014. The company’s new IT manager removed Raines’s computer passwords and made other security changes associated with the transition to a new IT manager. However, while utilizing the computer previously assigned to Raines, the new IT manager noticed that someone had logged into the computer remotely and copied files to an off-site server.

An examination revealed the company’s proprietary source code files and file folders were copied to Raines’s remote server during several sessions from May 16 to May 18, 2014. Law enforcement officers executed a search warrant at Raines’s residence on April 2, 2015, for evidence of the computer intrusion and theft of trade secrets. Copies of the proprietary source code for the company were on Raines’s home computer.

This proprietary source code is considered a trade secret by American Crane & Tractor Parts, which provides it a competitive advantage in its industry. The value of the proprietary source code exceeds $5,000, and the copying of this source code would provide a commercial advantage and a private financial gain to others.

According to court documents, Raines acted against his employer of almost a decade in a manner that could have potentially caused significant financial harm to the company. While it is not clear that Raines transferred the firm’s source codes to a third party once he stole them, it is certain he had the connections and means to provide them to at least one of the firm’s largest competitors.

Investigators also discovered that Raines had used his home computers and hard drives to access child pornography over the Internet since Nov. 13, 2013. Raines utilized peer-to-peer, file-sharing software to search for child pornography. Investigators discovered more than 7,000 files of child pornography images and videos on a DVD. Located in the hard drive of another desktop computer belonging to Raines were over 3,900 thumbnail images and 260 icon images of child pornography carved from unallocated space. Over 6,000 additional images and 25 videos of child pornography were also carved from the unallocated space of a separate loose hard drive belonging to Raines.

According to court documents, a recurring theme in the images Raines possessed and accessed was the graphic depiction of the rape and sodomy of pubescent and prepubescent girls, some as young as babies and toddlers, by adult men. Raines also possessed and accessed numerous images of young boys and girls engaging in sexually explicit conduct with other minors.

This case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney David Luna. It was investigated by the FBI.