Men Seeking Nude Photos Lured Into Net Extortion

Some men who got down and dirty with "Rita" on America Online's "Married But Looking" chat line got a letter from her enraged husband threatening to beat them up unless they paid up.

Now authorities say both Rita and her husband were one man, and all he really had on his mind was blackmail.

Veterinarian Ron Hornbaker, 29, of Shawnee Mission, Kan., pleaded guilty to extortion yesterday in a case some say illustrates problems in the unpoliced cyberspace. He faces two years in prison and fines up to $250,000.

"It's definitely a new way to commit one of the oldest crimes on earth," said assistant U.S. Attorney John McKenzie, who prosecuted the case in U.S. District Court in Rockford, Ill.

A Rockford, Ill., man alerted the FBI and helped them arrest Hornbaker.

In August 1995, Hornbaker created an America Online profile of himself as a married woman named Rita, authorities say. He would engage male victims in typed conversation, then ask them to go to a more confidential area called a private chat room "to get to know each other better."

There Rita would engage each man in erotic conversation and offer him provocative photos of herself.

Hornbaker, meanwhile, stored the conversations and printed out transcripts.

The men awaiting a nude photograph instead got a threatening letter in the mail. In it, Hornbaker - now posing as Rita's enraged husband - said he had found a transcript of the conversation between each man and his "wife" and asked for payment, usually an amount between $500 and $2,000.