Over the next year, Cashatt exploited an obscure software bug in one ultra-common model of hotel keycard lock to break into hotel after hotel in what would become an unprecedented, all-he-could-eat buffet of serial digital thievery. That spontaneous laundry heist was, in fact, the modest beginning of an epic crime spree. Tucking them under his arm, he quickly walked out the door, down the stairwell, out a side exit to the red Mitsubishi Galant he’d parked outside, and drove away. So on an impulse, he grabbed a pile of towels and pillows. Then he sat upright and started thinking about what he could steal.īolted to the dresser was an expensive-looking TV, but he didn’t have the tools to remove it. Even in his meth-addled state, he was so taken aback by his success in hacking his way in that he laid down on the room’s king-size bed for perhaps a full minute, his heart racing. “It was like the heavens had opened,” he’d say of the moment years later.Ĭashatt pushed open the unlocked door, walked into the room, and closed the door behind him.
Instantly, the lock whirred as its bolt retracted, and a green light flashed above the door handle.įor a moment, Cashatt stared in shock, almost disbelief. Then he held a frayed wire coming off the board to one end of the battery, completing an electric circuit. Instead, he reached underneath the lock on the door until his finger found a small, circular port and inserted the plug of his device. He looked at the keycard lock on the door in front of him, a metallic box that offered a vertical slot ready to accept a guest’s keycard like a piece of bread into a toaster.Ĭashatt didn’t have a keycard. On one end of that loosely assembled gadget was a cord attached to a plug.
He pulled out a sunglasses case from his pocket, flipped it open, and removed a small tangle of wires connected to a circuit board and a nine-volt battery. When he found a quiet stretch of hallway, Cashatt chose a door and knocked. Six feet tall with blond, close-cropped hair, he wore a black sports coat and baseball cap and kept his head down so the hat’s brim hid his face from surveillance cameras. On a warm Phoenix night five years ago, Aaron Cashatt walked down the red-carpeted hall of the second floor of a Marriott hotel, trying to move casually despite the adrenaline and methamphetamine surging through his bloodstream.
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