Do you really remember Kevin Mitnick? This question is for those who still have a great memory.

I think it was in the 1980s. Mitnick was imprisoned without charges for 5 or 6 years and someone wrote a letter to Henry Waxman Congressman from Santa Monica outraged for his imprisonment. This letter precipitated his trial. What was the name of the author of that letter. Waxman's office wouldn't say.

Thought he was arrested in the 90's? Happened during grad school, I thought, since I was living in LA.

He was first charged, tried and convicted in 1988 of breaking into the computer system of Digital Equipment Corporation and spent 12 months in prison and several years after on parole. He was also charged with hacking the Pacific Bell computer network in 1995 among other things and was arrested in 1995. In 1999 he admitted to multiple counts of wire fraud and computer fraud and was sentenced and served 5 years in prison, most of it prior to the conviction as he was in jail waiting trial.

In his book, The Art of Deception, Mitnick states that he compromised computers solely by using passwords and codes that he gained by social engineering. Basically, he was what used to be referred to as a "con man" although I am sure he had some serious computer skills. This whole fiasco showed the incredible lack of knowledge of computers on the part of the prosecution and there are some amusing stories about what they believed. There are a couple of books and a movie about this. One of the books authors never even interviewed Mitnick.

There was a lot of controversy and a lot of people who felt his punishment far outweighed the crime. As for your question about who wrote the letter, if one was written, I haven't got a clue. Never heard that before but I would think you could find something googling. Or you could try to contact Mitnick at his business site.

I don't know him personally except for what was written about him in the news and media. They also did a movie about him called Track Down. They also said he inspired many hackers and crackers as well.

Yes, also know as TakeDown. Nice film even if I prefer the absurd Hacker, just because there's a very young Angelina Jolie

I have read his book Ghost in the Wires and I don't recall reading about the letter. I also have his books The Art Of Deception and The Art Of Intrusion.
After reading his book and other sources about him I do think that he spent too much time in jail fr his crimes. However, he was also very arrogant and very stupid and brought most of the trouble on himself through extremely reckless and thoughtless actions.

He still is! I saw an interview with him about a year ago, can't remember where but he was bragging about how great his security company was and that they had never failed to hack a 'customer' computers/servers. Doing some of the things he did while he was on parole were not very bright.

I haven't seen the interview, but is it still "arrogance" if you're trying to promote your business?

Yes, exactly, he could have got a much lighter sentence or perhaps even got away with what he did completely had he not started hacking whilst in hiding. I got the impression that at one point all he would have had to do was keep his head down and not hack anything for a year and he could have gone back to hacking and remained out of prison.
Heck, he even pretty much proved the prosecution right by using phreaking tricks on the prison phone -- when the reason he was in solitary and had so many restrictions was to stop him doing just that.

Yes, but when a person has an intense obsession with computer cracking they just can't slow down. Not using a computer for some time It's like cold turkey to them.