Second Democrat staffer is charged over plan to ‘dox’ five Republicans senators during Kavanaugh confirmation fight after another aide was sentenced to four years for illegally posting addresses and telephone numbers online
DAILYMAIL.COM
20 June 2019
A former congressional staffer was sentenced to four years in prison Wednesday after pleading guilty to illegally posting online the home addresses and telephone numbers of five Republican senators who backed Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court nomination.
Jackson A. Cosko, a former computer systems administrator in the office of Sen. Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., pleaded guilty to five federal offenses, including making public restricted personal information, computer fraud, witness tampering and obstruction of justice.
His sentencing came as a second former Hassan aide was charged with assisting Cosko in revealing the private information, a practice known as ‘doxing.’
Samantha Deforest Davis, who worked as a staff assistant for Hassan until last December, faces misdemeanor charges of aiding and abetting computer fraud and attempted tampering with evidence. She was fired in December after Capitol Police discovered her possible involvement in the case.
Cosko, 27, of Washington, was fired from his job in May 2018 for what Hassan’s office said was failing to follow office procedures. His access to the senator’s office and her computer systems was terminated.
Cosko admitted he was angry over his firing, and he began an ‘extensive computer fraud and data theft scheme’ that he carried out by repeatedly burglarizing Hasan’s office, court records show.
During these break-ins, Cosko copied dozens of gigabytes of data from office computers, including dozens of user names and passwords belonging to Senate employees and personal contact information for numerous sitting senators.
In late September, while watching television coverage of Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Cosko became angry at several Republican senators. He acted on that anger, according to court records, by ‘maliciously publishing’ on Wikipedia and Twitter the home addresses and telephone numbers of Republican Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Mike Lee of Utah and Orrin Hatch of Utah. Hatch retired in January after 42 years in the Senate.
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