A California Highway Patrol officer is facing criminal charges after prosecutors alleged he illegally accessed a confidential law-enforcement database in order to help a friend’s business.
Todd Steaffens has been charged with three misdemeanor counts of computer access and fraud and three counts of disclosing DMV information without authorization, according to an Orange County District Attorney’s Office statement.
Steaffens, 43, has worked for the CHP since 2007. CHP officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Prosecutors allege that from February to July 2020 Steaffens used a computer at the CHP’s Westminster office to improperly access the California Law Enforcement Telecommunications System, which is supposed to be limited to official use only.
The system connects law-enforcement officers to databases maintained by the FBI and the DMV, among other agencies.
According to prosecutors, a friend who owned a Los Angeles automotive business asked Steaffens to run vehicle-identification numbers for cars he was interested in buying through the law-enforcement database.
Steaffens responded to his friend’s requests, sent via text, by passing on the vehicle information from the confidential database, according to prosecutors.
Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer said even “minor transgressions” when improperly accessing the law-enforcement database “must be prosecuted because they are unlawful and still (rise) to the level of abuse of power. …
“This conduct of misuse of an official, confidential law-enforcement database (for) a friend’s prospective car purchases has to be about the dumbest thing an officer can do to jeopardize his career and criminal record,” Spitzer said in the statement.
If convicted of all the charges, Steaffens faces up to three years in jail. He is scheduled to appear in court on April 21.
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