A New Jersey man has entered a guilty plea to charges that he hacked into a young woman's email account and retrieved nude photos of her without her authorization.
Attorney General Anne Milgram said that Mario Esposito, 21, of Hamilton, pleaded guilty to an accusation charging him with third-degree computer criminal activity before Superior Court Judge Gerald J. Council in Mercer County. The charge resulted from an investigation by the New Jersey State Police Cyber-Crimes Unit.
In pleading guilty, Esposito admitted that between May 17 and June 13 of this year, he logged into the Yahoo! email account of the 19-year-old victim without her authorization and accessed email files containing personal photographs.
The State Police investigation determined that he copied nude photographs of her from her email files into his own computer files.
Esposito was arrested on June 13, when State Police detectives executed a search warrant at his home and seized his home computer. He was released on $35,000 bail.
Under the plea agreement, the state will recommend a sentence of probation conditioned on Esposito serving a county jail term not to exceed 364 days. In addition, Esposito must undergo a psychological examination and participate in any course of treatment recommended as a result of that exam at his own expense. He will be prohibited from using the Internet during his period of probation except for employment or school purposes.
