Sunset Dragnet By Kevin Poulsen November 12, 1998 Justin Petersen, who led the FBI to hacker Kevin Mitnick, is back on the lam. It's Tuesday night at the Rainbow Room-- the legendary music industry hangout on the neon-studded west end of Hollywood's Sunset Boulevard-- and the regulars are just beginning to file in. It's an eclectic crowd. Young bohemians with curled goatees and black shirts are at the bar, and power-tie businessmen are speaking in hushed tones in the dining room. But the ubiquitous staples of the Rainbow scene are the longhaired, leather-clad rockers. Some are young Dionysians. Others have faces etched by years of fast living on the Strip. At 9 p.m., a buzz shoots through the club as three rough-looking men, flannel shirts hanging casually over bench-pressed frames, swagger through the door and sidle up to the bar. The kids, the tourists, who show up ignorant of the history and character of the place, are clueless-- but the rockers know. These men are cops. More than that, they're United States Marshals, and they're here looking for one of the Rainbow's own-- perhaps the most flamboyant member of their caste-- a former hacker, FBI informant, and one-legged pick-up artist whose name is whispered from mouth to ear as the rockers look anywhere but at the agents. Justin Petersen is on the run again. In the past two weeks, the Feds have become regulars at the bars and strip joints that dot Sunset Boulevard. They've flashed Petersen's mug shot at the Body Shop, the Seventh Veil, the Three-Sixty Room. This is their fourth trip to the Rainbow. A rumor is circulating that there's a $35,000 reward out on the 38-year-old, longhaired Lothario. It's a false rumor: Under the Marshals' sliding scale the fugitive is worth-- at most-- two grand. But even that tightfisted bounty could buy some mercenary rocker a nice Gibson Double-Cutaway Pro guitar. But Petersen is no stranger to the fugitive's life, and he knows the Rainbow is always the first place they look for him. Flashback In the early nineties, Justin Petersen was a fixture on the Sunset Strip, and he supported a lavish lifestyle of fast cars and women by dabbling in a plethora of crimes, including identity theft, wiretapping for hire, and grand theft auto. When he was caught, he informed on some of his friends and associates (myself included), then wore a wire to help the Feds nail hacker Kevin Mitnick on a probation violation. As a paid FBI informant, Petersen earned some pocket change and managed to stay out of prison. At least for a while. In October of 1993, Petersen's public service was drawing to a close, and according to court records, he gravitated back to a more rewarding profession: credit card fraud. As a touch of poetic justice, it was one of the targets of Petersen's tattling who discovered his double life. Former hacker Ron Austin suspected that his snitch had returned to a life of crime, and he found the proof in Petersen's trash. Austin's dumpster sleuthing prompted hacker chronicler Jonathan Littman to dub him the Garbageman. According to court records, when prosecutor David Schindler confronted Petersen with the recycled evidence, the cyberpunk vanished into the underground. His flight lasted 10 months-- while FBI agents scoured his Hollywood haunts-- and ended when Austin, still on the case, tracked him to a girlfriend's apartment five miles from the Rainbow Room. Petersen was soon serving a 41-month sentence for his original crimes and for a half-completed $150,000 electronic bank heist that he'd begun while a fugitive. That was the story behind Petersen's latest appearance in the courtroom of federal judge Steven Wilson on August 24. He had been free for more than a year when he was hauled in on a probation violation for failing to obtain employment since his release, and thus failing to make restitution payments to the court. Petersen admitted the violations, and probation officer Kathy Nash recommended that he be given another chance-- under tighter controls. Petersen would submit to psychiatric counseling and stay in a local halfway house, where he would be free to come and go during the day but would check back in by 9 p.m. each night. Jay Lichtman, Petersen's attorney, protested the curfew: "Petersen is attempting to pursue self-employment, and that involves contacting people by computer and making phone calls-- sometimes late at night." Judge Wilson was unmoved and joined in prosecutor Schindler's view that Petersen was already getting a lucky break. He also commented on Petersen's hair. In an email interview with CyberCrime editors after the hearing, Petersen complained that the probation office was making it difficult for him to reestablish himself in society, and was demanding money that he needed to replace his aging prosthetic leg. "It would almost seem that they are making committing crimes more attractive," he wrote. "If they really wanted to help me, they would help me in finding medical assistance." After I reported on the case, and commended Petersen on his apparent efforts to walk the straight and narrow after a decade of crime, the cyberpunk sent another, somewhat angrier note retracting his email comments and arguing that he was never a snitch. "I never gave up anybody that didn't have it coming," he wrote. Petersen also complained that the column was unfair and vengeful. "Haven't you heard that living well is the best revenge? Well, that's my practice." Petersen then began what would be a very short stay in an alien world. Four miles east of the Rainbow Room, Sunset Boulevard becomes a very different place. Here, homeless youths walk the streets selling fake gold jewelry, and the neon signs advertise cheap motels. The only nightlife is the 24-hour laundromat. One block from this forlorn thoroughfare, the Vinewood Community Corrections Center squats anonymously on a modest residential street. The paint peeling from the main building is two shades of beige, and a ragged basketball net hangs from the side of an adjacent dorm. This is where Justin Petersen spent his last weeks in The System-- suspended between prison and freedom in the halfway house that was once the Eden Motel. One can only speculate on how a lifestyle of public transportation and early lights-out affected the man who once epitomized late-night excess on the Sunset Strip, but court records indicate that, within a few weeks of Petersen's commitment, Judge Wilson tightened the reins a bit more. Perhaps wondering exactly what kind of work would require Petersen's use of a computer and telephone late into the night, the judge ordered, on September 18, that Petersen "submit documentation as requested to verify the legitimacy of his self-employment ventures." Judge Wilson also laid down the law on Petersen's delinquent restitution, ordering that he pay 20 percent of his gross toward his financial obligations. Criminal defense attorney and computer-crime specialist Jennifer Granick speculates that the flat tax may have been a factor in Petersen's next decision. "Twenty percent! Churches only ask for ten. That's more than God wants!... Depending on what he's making, that can really prohibit him from taking care of a lot of important personal needs." What happened next is unclear; Petersen's probation officer, the Vinewood warders, and prosecutor Schindler all declined comment, and Petersen's attorney didn't return phone calls. But court records show that, on September 30, probation officer Nash filed a complaint with the court alleging that, on each of the three days following the revision of his supervised release, "Justin Tanner Petersen violated the policies" of the halfway house and "was subsequently disfavorably discharged from the program." Judge Wilson signed the arrest warrant the same day, but by then, Petersen had vanished. One month later, the US Marshals made their first appearance at the Rainbow, only to find that dumb luck had spared their prey. "I'll tell you, they were a day late and a dollar short," says the Rainbow's manager, Tony, over the music and clinking bottles. "He was here the day before they showed up, giving an interview for Venezuela TV." If the trail at the Rainbow was hot when the manhunters first appeared, it chilled quickly. Petersen has been coming here for years, and no doubt expected that the Feds would make it their first stop. "When they were here last week," offered a Rainbow denizen who spoke on condition of anonymity, "anyone who said more than, 'I don't know what you're talking about,' told them, 'I think he left town.'" By Saturday, news of the Marshals' visits to the club had already spread through the longhair grapevine. When Kevin Mitnick, securely locked up in the federal jail downtown, got the word from another inmate with ties to the Sunset scene, he hit the phones, and within minutes, the Internet learned what the rockers already knew: Justin Petersen was on the lam again. On Monday, an electronic wanted poster appeared on the Web at justinpetersen.com. Two months ago, the URL had been Petersen's, entirely devoted to self-aggrandizing PR about his value as a computer expert, and photos of him with his leggy girlfriend. But Petersen apparently didn't pay the $70 Internic bill and lost the address. The site, under new management, now includes a sampling of Petersen's contributions to hacker magazines, a smattering of biographical information (which Chaos Theory has not reviewed for accuracy), and details of Petersen's fugitive status, complete with a grainy photo and a phone number for the US Marshals. The Internic identifies the owner as one Ron Austin. The Garbageman, it seems, is back on the case. If captured, and assuming he commits no further crimes, Petersen faces 5 to 11 months in jail for walking away from supervision. Back at the Rainbow, the Marshals appear ready to give up on the club. They aren't showing the mug shot anymore, just sitting at the bar and enjoying their drinks. Tony stands inside the entrance, commanding respect in a tailored suit, framed by a photo montage of Rainbow regulars that includes a snapshot of Petersen with one of his female conquests. He recalls his last conversation with the man he's known for a decade, when he encouraged the flamboyant rocker to turn himself in and face the music. "I told him, do what you gotta do. You're young still," Tony says, his voice thick with an Italian accent and wistful, almost fatherly sadness. "And you know what he told me?" "He said, 'You do the time.'" The Rainbow patriarch shakes his head slowly in disbelief.