For years, Gregory Evans has maintained that his 1998 guilty plea that lead to serving two years in prison was due to "computer hacking". To this day, Evans continues to advertise himself as a convicted hacker on his personal web page and the LIGATT investor relations page:
Fact 1 . Gregory Evans was ordered to pay back $10 million to AT&T, MCI and other fortune 500 companies due to computer hacking.
In reality, Evans' conviction is based on 18:371 CONSPIRACY, 18:1343 WIRE FRAUD, and 18:2 AIDING AND ABETTING, CAUSING AN ACT TO BE DONE (2-6), as outlined in his court docket. An article from The Press-Enterprise, written in November 1998 sums it up. Note the words "conducting a scam" and "used false names [..] to obtain telephone numbers":
November 24, 1998 Edition: RIVERSIDE Section: LOCAL Page: B03 Index Terms: CRIME FRAUD INTERNET Riverside man pleads guilty in cyber case Author: The Press-Enterprise A Riverside man pleaded guilty in Los Angeles Monday to federal conspiracy and wire fraud for his part in a scheme that sold more than 125 fraudulently obtained toll-free telephone numbers to budding cyber businesses nationwide. Gregory D. Evans, 33, president and chief managing officer of Riverside-based ICB Communications, admitted to conducting a scam that between November 1996 and June 1997 cost AT&T and MCI at least $9 million. Evans and his company, which did business as Connect America, used false names and addresses to obtain 800 and 880 telephone numbers, according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Angela J. Davis. These numbers were then resold to small Internet service providers. When bills sent by phone companies to false addresses were returned, service was shut off, leaving cyber businesses without phone service, Davis said. AT&T, which suffered most of the losses, conducted an investigation before referring the matter to the FBI in June 1997. AT&T has filed a $7.4 million civil suit against Evans and his company in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles. The civil case is scheduled for trial in June. Evans is scheduled to be sentenced Feb. 22 by District Court Judge Dickran Tevrizian. Evans faces up to 30 years in federal prison and fines of up to $1.5 million. Copyright (c) 1998, 2000 The Press-Enterprise Co. Record Number: 260939