Hacker ‘Guccifer’ Sentenced to 52 Months
Portraits of former Presidents George W. Bush, left, and his father, George H.W. Bush, both painted by George W. Bush, are on display as part of "The Art of Leadership: A President's Diplomacy" exhibit. Benny Snyder/AP
Marcel Lehel Lazar, 44, will serve time for unauthorized access to a protected computer and aggravated identity theft.
The Romanian hacker who shared George W. Bush paintings with the world and says he found Hillary Clinton’s private email server was sentenced to 52 months in federal prison, says a Justice Department statement.
Marcel Lehel Lazar, 44, known as Guccifer, will serve time for unauthorized access to a protected computer and aggravated identity theft. According to Lazar’s May 25 plea agreement, he accessed about 100 Americans’ email and social media accounts from October 2012 to January 2014 to get personal information and email correspondence.
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Guccifer’s victim list features political officials and the rich and famous: former U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, members of the Bush family, and Obama administration officials, comedian Steve Martin, editor Tina Brown; ex-Nixon aide John Dean, author Kitty Kelley, actress Mariel Hemingway, three members of the U.K.’s House of Lords, a former Air Force secretary, the director of Romania’s domestic intelligence service, among others.
The Smoking Gun reported he also had the fourth-season finale of “Downton Abbey” before it aired in England.
“Lazar sought fame by hacking the private online accounts of Americans and releasing their personal information to the public; instead, he has been convicted in United States federal court,” said Assistant Attorney General Leslie Caldwell in a release about Lazar’s plea.
Lazar will serve 24-month and 28-month consecutive sentences in the U.S. and then complete a 7-year sentence in Romania, according to NBC News.