Ghost in the Wires_ My Adventures as the World's Most Wanted Hacker - Kevin Mitnick [110]
I presented my credentials and a filled-out application form. It would take about three weeks for the card to arrive, I was told—much longer than I felt comfortable staying in Vegas, but I knew I couldn’t get a job anywhere without that card.
Meanwhile I trotted around to the nearest branch library, where a librarian was happy to hand me a library card as soon as she finished typing up the info from my application.
Though my primary focus was on pulling together my new identity and deciding where I was going to live and work, Danny Yelin, formerly of Teltec but now freelancing, was still feeding me some work. One job was to serve a subpoena on a guy who lived in Vegas but was in hiding. Dan provided me with his last known phone number.
I called the number, an elderly lady answered, and I asked if the man was there. She said he wasn’t.
I told her, “I owe him some money. I can pay half now and half next week. But I’m leaving town, so I need you to call him and find out where he wants to meet me so I can pay him the first half.” And I said I’d call back in half an hour.
After about ten minutes, I called the Switching Control Center at Centel, the local phone company. Posing as an internal employee, I had a DMS-100 switch tech do a QCM (Query Call Memory command) on the lady’s number.
She had made her most recent call about five minutes earlier, to a Motel 6 near the airport. I called and when I was connected to his room, I said I was from the front desk, and did he still need the roll-away bed he had asked about. Of course he said he hadn’t asked about a roll-away. I said, “Is this room 106?”
Sounding annoyed, he said, “No, it’s 212.” I apologized.
My grandmother was kind enough to drive me over there.
My knock was answered by “Yeah.”
“Housekeeping, you have a minute?”
He opened the door. I said, “Are you Mr. ______?”
“Yeah.”
I handed him the documents and said, “You are served. Have a nice day.”
An easy $300. As I signed the proof of service, I smiled to myself and wondered, What would that guy think if he knew he’d just been served a subpoena by a Federal fugitive?
Once in a while I’d walk to the Sahara to have a meal in the restaurant where my mom worked, so we could see each other. Other times I’d meet Gram, my mom, and my mom’s boyfriend, Steve, at one of the other casinos, where I hoped we could get lost in the crowds. Occasionally, but not too often, I’d show up at a small casino called the Eureka, where Mom liked to play video poker after she finished her work shift.
Money was an issue. I had some but not enough. Incredibly, at age twenty-eight, I still had most of my bar mitzvah money in U.S. Treasury bonds, which I now cashed in. Between them, my mom and Gram came up with some more to tide me over until I could get settled and find a job. Altogether, my bankroll totaled about $11,000—enough to live on until I could establish my new life.
And “bankroll” was the right word for it: I had the entire amount in cash, stashed in a wallet inside a man’s carry-on bag that I toted everywhere with me.
Since I didn’t yet have my Eric Weiss “replacement” Social Security card, I couldn’t open an account at a credit union or a bank. The hotel I had chosen didn’t have a room safe like the fancier places. Rent a safety deposit box at a bank? Couldn’t do that either, for the same reason I couldn’t open an account: I’d have to show some government-issued ID.
Of course, stashing the money in my hotel room was out of the question. But how about leaving the wad with Gram? No, because then we’d have to keep meeting every time I ran out of cash. Not a very good plan if the Feds started watching her.
Still, if I had it to do over, that’s just what I would have