Last modified: Wednesday, January 23, 2008 10:58 AM PST Fruitland man adopts Alford plea in court case By William Lundquist Argus Observer Payette — A Fruitland banker accused by a customer of using her personal information to illegally access her voice mail messages, pleaded guilty Jan. 15 to a misdemeanor charge of unauthorized access of a computer, but continued to assert his innocence. During a change of plea hearing in the Third District Magistrates Court in Payette County, Robert Reed Frye, manager of the Fruitland branch of the Intermountain Community Bank, entered an Alford plea, a motion whereby he pleaded guilty but did not admit to any offense. Under Idaho law, a defendant can enter an Alford plea to take advantage of favorable plea negotiations. Under Rule 11 of the binding plea agreement the state, “. . . affirmatively represents that no direct evidence exists which would establish that the Defendant improperly obtained or utilized bank information or otherwise improperly utilized bank resources during the course of any activities alleged in this case.” At the change of plea hearing, Frye made no comments except to say he understood and voluntarily agreed to the Rule 11 binding plea agreement which also states, in part, “The Defendant asserts that he is innocent. In entering his plea of guilty, the Defendant is not admitting that he committed the alleged offense, but rather is waiving his right to a trial and pleading guilty to take advantage of favorable plea negotiations.” Judge William B. Dillon III sentenced Frye to pay $75.50 in court costs and perform 32 hours of community service for the Payette County Sheriff’s Office. Dillon also sentenced Frye to 60 days of unsupervised probation, the only condition being that he not commit a felony or misdemeanor during that time. By voluntarily pleading guilty under the conditions of the Alford plea, Frye told the judge at his change of plea hearing that he understood he was giving up the right to any defense, and the right to a jury trial with the presumption of innocence until proven guilty that would come with a trial.   Bizarre case The individual who issued the complaint in the case, Keri Rock, Ontario, asserted her privacy had been violated. In an interview with Cascade Police Department Chief Ryan Redmon Jan. 23, 2007, Rock said that the incident began in July 2006. Rock said on July 26, 2006 while she and her husband were in Las Vegas, she received several calls on her cell phone and her caller ID showed them to be from a restricted number. When she attempted to access her voice mail to see if a message had been left, a recording said her access code had been entered into the system and that messages were already being retrieved from an outside party. She called her cell phone’s customer service line and was told someone was indeed accessing her voice mail messages. Rock said she immediately changed her pass code to block the access, but received a total of 16 calls from the restricted number by noon the next day. She told Redmon she believed someone was still attempting to access her messages. Among the three messages Rock asserted had been in her voice mail when it was illegally accessed was one from Tom Limbaugh, the mayor of Fruitland. Rock told Redmon that she filed a report with the Ontario Police Department, which, as part of its investigation, served a subpoena to obtain phone records to find out who had hacked into her voice mail. Before the results came in, however, Rock said Limbaugh contacted her and told her that on July 30, 2006, Frye had arrived at his home with a tape recorder and played a recording of the cell phone call that Limbaugh had sent to Rock and that had been saved in her voice mail. In addition, Rock told Redmon that when the phone records arrived, they showed the number used to attempt to retrieve, or retrieve, her phone messages was from Frye’s cell phone and the home phone of a Kerry Baumgardner, who apparently accompanied Frye to Limbaugh’s home.  Rock said she was a customer of the Fruitland branch of the Intermountain Community Bank, which Frye manages, and she used the last four digits of her Social Security number as the access code for her cell phone voice mail. In his report Redmon wrote, “Rock clearly felt that Frye had obtained her personal information from the bank and called her cell phone tape recording system numerous times until he used her correct information to find the pass code. This is why she believes he called numerous times on the date in question.” Redmon said he interviewed Limbaugh a week later and Limbaugh confirmed what Rock had said about Frye coming to his residence to play the recording of the calls he apparently recorded from Rock’s voice mail. On July 23, 2007, Valley County Prosecuting Attorney Matt Williams, serving as a special prosecuting attorney for Payette County, filed a criminal complaint against Frye for unauthorized use or access of a computer, in this case the computerized voice mail system used by Rock’s cell phone. Redmon’s interview with Rock was part of the complaint. On Jan. 3, Frye’s attorney, John Bujak, Nampa, filed a defendant’s discovery response with the court. In it, Bujak said Frye intended to introduce as evidence Rock’s cell phone records, love letters written by Rock to Frye, an investigative report prepared and published in Payette County at the direction of Rock, and copies of letters sent to local businesses about the case in an attempt to libel Frye which Frye believed were sent by Rock. Rock gave a statement stating she believed what Frye did was premeditated and that he had played her recorded messages for “who knows how many people?”