Father Puzzled By His Son's Threats Against Bill Gates

Even to his family, it's a puzzle why the young man from a Chicago suburb apparently attempted to extort $5 million from Microsoft founder Bill Gates.

"That's the 64-million-dollar question," Dana Pletcher, father of 21-year-old Adam Pletcher, said today from his home in Long Grove, Ill.

"I don't think he would have gone through with it. I think it became a game . . . cloak and dagger, like a spy game," Pletcher said.

But it is no game to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Adam Pletcher has been indicted by a federal grand jury in Seattle for sending Gates four threatening letters in March and April, telling Gates to reply on America Online.

Instead, FBI agents responded via computer and the investigation eventually led to the arrest of Adam Pletcher earlier this month. He since has been released on $100,000 bond.

Extorting money is totally inconsistent with anything his son has ever done, said Dana Pletcher, who described his son as a "good writer, articulate and intelligent."

"This is the kind of thing that belongs in a novel, a suspense-action book. It doesn't belong in real life," Dana Pletcher said.

His son did get into trouble recently when he used the Internet to establish a wholesale car-buying business, Dana Pletcher said. Adam took deposits from three people but did not buy the cars and spent the money on his business, "but he's paying those people back," Pletcher said of his son.

Adam is scheduled for a pre-trial hearing in Seattle Thursday, but he does not want his family involved, because it already has embarrassed them, Dana Pletcher said.

"He takes responsibility for this. He feels terrible about the impact it's had on his family and friends, and he feels very sorry for whatever grief it caused Gates and his family," the father said.

Dana Pletcher said his son is owning up to the matter.

Adam does not want to work any loopholes in the legal system with a high-powered attorney, Dana Pletcher said. His son places a high degree of value on honesty, the father said.