Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Wireless Intercept-

From: Marcel <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 16 Mar 2003 05:35:07 -0500

Tom and Nicole's Eavesdropper Gets Easy 6
by Daniel Frankel
May 17, 1999, 5:15 PM PT
back to story

A six-month cruise through a halfway house.

That, and a $3,000 fine, is the sentence a paparazzo received Monday, after pleading
guilty to intercepting and
recording a cell phone conversation between movie star couple Tom Cruise and Nicole
Kidman, then selling the
tape to a British tabloid.

"Your honor, I am sorry, definitely sorry for what I did," Eric Ford, 27, told U.S.
District judge Terry Hatter Jr.
before his sentencing. "I have learned my lesson."

Speaking to reporters outside the Los Angeles courtroom, though, the Sherman Oaks,
California, shutterbug
seemed a little less contrite, accusing a friend of his of selling him out to the Cruises.
"[He or she] was paid
$50,000 by Tom Cruise...to turn me in, basically," Ford explained.

He added that he'd have been much happier with the home-confinement sentence his lawyer
had asked the
judge for (that, and a smaller, $1,500 fine), but conceded a halfway house is "better than
jail."

Ford was indicted in December on federal wire-tapping charges. He was accused of using a
modified Radio Shack
scanner to intercept a February 1998 conversation between Cruise and Kidman.

(Ford, a photographer, claimed he was merely using the scanner to stake out Kidman--while
she was on the Los
Angeles set of Practical Magic--so he could find her and take her picture. He claims he
"accidentally" recorded
the conversation.)

After reportedly approaching London's wise News of the World--which didn't want to engage
in such illicit
activity--Ford managed to sell the recording to the Globe tabloid for $2,500 (that's 20
times less than the
amount his so-called "friend" got for allegedly ratting him out to Cruise, for those of
you keeping track).

"I figured, maybe, there was a way to make money," the entrepreneurial Ford explained.

A June 30, 1998, article in the Globe quotes Kidman as telling her husband their marriage
is "hanging by a
thread."

The Cruises adamantly charge the statements are inaccurate and taken out of context.
Surprisingly, given the
recent spate of litigation the star couple has pursued against various tabloids, the Globe
has not been sued or
criminally charged in the matter--yet.

Ford--who pleaded guilty to one charge of federal wire-tapping as part of an agreement
with prosecutors in
March--is the first to be sentenced in such a case.

"They picked Mr. Ford out because Tom and Nicole are obviously very big celebrities," the
paparazzo's lawyer,
Eric Chase, told reporters outside court. "And it feels bad to be the trendsetter in this
kind of case."

In any event, after finishing his halfway-house stay, Ford plans to continue in his
zero-respect profession. "I
don't plan to change careers," he said. "[Being a paparazzo] is what I do for a living."

http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/Pf/0,1527,4775,00.html

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