Lancaster County, Pa., coroner G. Gary Kirchner, 73, was charged Monday by the Pennsylvania attorney general's office in connection with the incidents, which allegedly occurred between 2004 and 2005.
"Publicizing confidential law enforcement information can compromise official investigations and jeopardize the safety of witnesses or citizens who file complaints," Attorney General Tom Corbett said in a statement. "Dr. Kirchner breached the security of the 911 Web site and violated the public trust in order to help a small group of reporters gain an edge over competing media outlets."
The incidents were discovered after a county police detective read a story on a murder in the Aug. 22, 2005 edition of the Intelligencer Journal, the morning newspaper in Lancaster, Pa., according to a 19-page report from a county grand jury that reviewed the case. The story attributed details about the murder to the county's 911 Web site, which had public and private, police-only sections. The detective was surprised to see details about the murder probe in the paper that were only supposed to be available in the secure police-only section of the site.
A 911 center supervisor later warned police of a possible breach of the site and a county IT worker checked logs for the site, according to the grand jury report. That review found log-in information for some Web site visits that used Kirchner's username and password from IP addresses traced to computers used by reporters at the newspaper. The grand jury report said Kirchner gave his log-in information to a reporter at the paper, who then apparently shared it with four others who covered police news.
Kirchner has denied giving the log-in information to anyone, according to the grand jury report.
An IT department inquiry showed that the private, official section of the 911 Web site was allegedly accessed from IP addresses used by the newspaper 57 times. Those site visits, between Aug. 7, 2005 and Aug. 21, 2005, used Kirchner's username and password, according to the grand jury.
The confidential site includes warnings telling users that they are entering a secure government computer system and that unauthorized access may result in criminal prosecution, according to the grand jury. A series of related e-mails between the reporters and the coroner about the use of the site was also detailed in the grand jury report.
One of the reporters told the grand jury that Kirchner gave her his 911 log-in information so she could get answers to her news questions without having to call him and ask him the questions. At least one of the reporters told the grand jury that since Kirchner provided the log-in information, the coroner had presumably given the reporter authorization to use the confidential site, according to the grand jury.
Kirchner has been charged with one count of unlawful use of a computer and one count of criminal conspiracy to commit unlawful use of a computer. Each charge is a third-degree felony and is punishable by up to seven years in prison and a US$15,000 fine.
Kirchner said Wednesday he had no comment on the charges. His attorney, Emmanuel Dimitriou, of Reading, Pa., also declined to comment.
Charles Raymond Shaw, the editor of the newspaper, declined to comment on the grand jury report. "Given what we know now, we certainly would have done something differently," he said. The reporters were not made available to comment.
Kevin Harley, the attorney general's press secretary, said Kirchner faces a preliminary hearing before a local magistrate who will decide whether there is enough evidence for the case to go to trial. Kirchner had signed documents certifying that his official use of the 911 Web site was for his work as coroner and that the information would not be released to the public, Harley said.
Kirchner, a Republican, is running for re-election this year. He was elected to the post in 2004.