Former Cardinals Scouting Director Chris Correa Indicted, Pleads Guilty

The St. Louis Cardinals’ former scouting chief pleaded guilty Friday in a Texas federal courtroom to five hacking counts (PDF) in connection to unlawfully accessing a highly confidential database of another Major League Baseball (MLB) team, the Houston Astros. The U.S. Attorney’s claim – which came after months of FBI investigation spurred by a leak of internal documents in July 2014 – had a number of explosive details, beyond any type of drama we’re used to seeing in baseball.

Jeff Luhnow, the general manager of the Astros, once held a prominent position with the Cardinals front office, and was responsible for numerous analytic advancements made within the Cardinals organization in terms of drafting and developing players. Correa was able to access the former Cardinals employee’s email once again on his old laptop and obtained the new URL and newly reset passwords for all employees, according to the DOJ.

He put the financial damages for all of Correa’s computer intrusions at $1.7 million.

Luhnow created the same type of computer system in Houston as he had in St. Louis.

Each of the counts carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison and $250,000 fine.

The St. Louis Cardinals prepare to play the Chicago Cubs in the 2015 National League Division Series.

Correa, during a his plea hearing, told the judge Friday that his hacking between 2013-2014 was “stupid”. He took his position with the Astros in 2011.

Internet activist Aaron Swartz committed suicide after the Justice Department charged him with criminal hacking under the CFAA for downloading documents from a research database.

All of this information was on a private online database, also known as Ground Control, which included the email accounts of Astros employees, ABC News reports.

The St. Louis Cardinals are one of the best teams in baseball (although I’m seriously hoping the Chicago Cubs take on that reputation this year). During the June 2013 amateur draft, Correa intruded into that account again and viewed information on players who had not yet been drafted as well as several players drafted by the Astros and other teams.