A U.S. District choose in Florida sentenced a convicted intercourse offender to 220 years in federal jail for producing, receiving and possessing youngster intercourse abuse materials, and for hacking the jumbotron within the Jacksonville Jaguars’ stadium after the staff didn’t renew his contract upon studying that he was a registered intercourse offender.
U.S. District Choose Brian J. Davis sentenced Samuel Arthur Thompson, 53, for the offenses Tuesday, the U.S. Legal professional’s Workplace for the Center District of Florida mentioned in a launch. A federal jury convicted Thompson in November 2023 of the offenses, in addition to of manufacturing youngster intercourse abuse materials whereas required to register as a intercourse offender, violating the Intercourse Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA) and possessing a firearm as a convicted felon.
Thompson was beforehand convicted of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old boy in Alabama in 1998 and was required to register as a intercourse offender.
Federal prosecutors mentioned of their launch that Thompson was employed by the Jaguars round 2013 to assist design and set up the stadium’s fundamental display and was then tasked with working it on sport days.
“Thompson’s contract with the Jaguars required him to report his conviction, however he didn’t. In January 2018, the Jaguars decided to not renew Thompson’s contract after studying of his conviction and standing as a registered intercourse offender,” the discharge mentioned. “Earlier than the expiration of Thompson’s contract in March 2018, Thompson put in distant entry software program on a spare server within the Jaguars’ server room. Thompson then remotely accessed computer systems that managed the Jumbotron throughout three 2018 season NFL video games, inflicting the video boards to repeatedly malfunction.”
The Jaguars finally discovered a spare server, and through its subsequent sport in December 2018 captured the IP handle of the intruder making an attempt to remotely management the jumbotron. The FBI traced the intruder’s IP handle to Thompson’s residence, per the discharge.
In July 2019, the FBI searched Thompson’s house, seizing his computer systems and a firearm that he was prohibited from possessing as a convicted felon. The FBI discovered information from Thompson’s gadgets that confirmed they had been used to remotely entry the spare server, in addition to hundreds of pictures and a whole lot of movies depicting youngster intercourse abuse materials, in keeping with the discharge.
“Samuel Thompson repeatedly abused and exploited harmless kids, inflicting immeasurable harm on his victims,” Coult Markovsky, FBI Jacksonville’s appearing particular agent in cost, mentioned in a press release. “He additionally abused and exploited his employer by putting in malicious software program to control their techniques, which may have brought on considerably extra injury if not detected.”
In a press release launched in November after Thompson’s conviction, the Jaguars thanked prosecutors for his or her work on the case.
(Picture: Perry Knotts / Getty Photographs)
