PI’s illegally access NCIC

http://blog.nola.com/tpnorthshore/2009/01/former_st_tammany_district_att_1.html

Former St. Tammany district attorney’s staffer sold criminal records from federal database to private investigators

Posted by The Times-Picayune January 23, 2009 5:52PM

Categories: News Impact Page

A former employee of the St. Tammany District Attorney’s Office has pleaded guilty in federal court to improperly tapping into a national crime database in order to sell people’s criminal histories to private investigators.

Vicky L. Munn, 42, used the access she had as a supervisor in the district attorney’s worthless checks division to generate “rap sheets” and sell them on dozens of occasions during an 18-month period beginning in January 2003, according to prosecutors.

Now a resident of Traverse City, Mich., she faces a maximum prison term of five years and a fine of $250,000 for conspiring to exceed authorized access to a government database, U.S. Attorney Jim Letten said Friday.

Munn and one of the private investigators, Todd Kelly, 40, of River Ridge, entered guilty pleas Thursday. Both defendants are scheduled for sentencing on May 14.

Another private investigator, Charles E. Barnett Jr., also was indicted in June 2008 for his alleged involvement in the scheme.

The district attorney’s office uses the National Crime Information Center, an electronic criminal database managed by the FBI, to get information such as arrest and conviction histories, addresses, driver’s license information and other legal and personal details.

The record Munn sold were from the NCIC, but she does not appear to have plumbed the district attorney’s own files, prosecutors said.

The FBI informed the district attorney’s office in May 2004 that Munn was under investigation. District Attorney Walter Reed suspended her on May 21, 2004. She was fired from her job on Sept. 17, 2004.