A Kentucky man who hacked into state death registry systems to fake his own death in a bid to avoid paying over $100,000 in outstanding child support has been sentenced to over six years in prison, prosecutors announced Tuesday.
Jesse Kipf, 39, was sentenced Monday in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky in a plea agreement on charges of computer fraud and aggravated identity theft.
In January 2023, Kipf accessed the Hawaii death registry system using the information of a physician living in another state and created a case for his own death, prosecutors said in a news release.
He completed a Hawaii death certificate worksheet, assigned himself as the medical certifier for the case and certified his death using the doctor’s digital signature — resulting in his being registered as a deceased person in many government databases, the release said.
Officials said he admitted to faking his own death in part “to avoid outstanding child support obligations.”
He owed more than $116,000, according to the sentencing memorandum.
He didn’t stop there.
Kipf also infiltrated other state death registry systems, private business networks and government and corporate networks “using credentials he stole from real people.” Then, he tried to sell access to those networks on the dark web, prosecutors said in the release.
Kipf acknowledged having databases of personal identifiable information on his electronic devices, including Social Security numbers and medical records, which he sold “to international buyers, including individuals from Algeria, Russia and Ukraine,” the sentencing memorandum said.
The damage to the state death registry systems included nearly $80,000 in repair costs, as well as “untold consequences in trying to rectify the networks and the harm to the individuals whose personally identifying information was exposed, stolen or misused,” the filing said.
Kipf must serve 85% of his prison sentence, and upon his release he will be under the supervision of the U.S. Probation Office for three years. His attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
A federal grand jury initially indicted Kipf in November on five counts of computer fraud and three counts of aggravated identity theft, the Justice Department said in a news release. He was accused of illegally accessing state websites for Arizona, Hawaii and Vermont, as well as the businesses GuestTek Interactive Entertainment Ltd. and Milestone Inc.
Carlton S. Shier IV, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Kentucky, called his plot “cynical and destructive.”
“This case is a stark reminder of how damaging criminals with computers can be, and how critically important computer and online security is to us all,” he said. “Fortunately, through the excellent work of our law enforcement partners, this case will serve as a warning to other cyber criminals, and he will face the consequences of his disgraceful conduct.”