A 39-year-old man from Somerset, Kentucky, has been sentenced to 81 months in federal prison for identity theft and fraudulently registering himself as deceased in government systems.
According to a press release from the U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ), Jesse Kipf used stolen credentials to infiltrate the Hawaii Death Registry System, where he falsely registered his death.
Kipf’s motive for this intrusion was to evade his child support obligations. In January 2023, he accessed the Hawaii Death Registry System using the username and password of a physician from another state. He then created a false death record for himself, completed the necessary documentation, and used the physician’s digital signature to certify his death, as detailed in the DoJ’s statement.
This fraudulent action led to Kipf being listed as deceased in U.S. government databases, effectively nullifying his child support responsibilities—a fact he later admitted was his primary reason for the crime.
In addition to this, Kipf also accessed private corporate networks and government systems using stolen credentials and attempted to sell access to these networks on dark web markets.
