A Tennessee man accused of stealing Mitt Romney's tax returns to blackmail him says two grainy pictures of cats led federal agents to him.
Back in September a group of hackers claimed it had stolen Mitt Romney's tax returns from PriceWaterhouseCoopers' offices in Franklin, Tenn. Someone then mailed a thumb drive to Romney's accounting office demanding $1 million in exchange for the documents.
And on Sept. 14, authorities thought they found their guy when they showed up at Michael Brown's house at 6:14 a.m., WSMV reported Monday.
"They said they're here to serve a search warrant for Romney's tax returns," Brown told the TV station. "My first reaction was, 'You've got to be kidding me.'"
The feds said they suspected Brown after discovering two grainy, black-and-white pictures of cats that believe belong to Brown on the illicit thumb drive, according to Brown.
“They didn’t want to show anything to me," Brown told The Daily. "They did it to my wife. They said, ‘These are your cats.’ When she objected, they were like, ‘Yes, they are.’”
Agents even took pictures of Brown's cats to compare to the ones in the blackmail offer, according to Brown.
But Brown insists the cats in question aren't his and actually belong to a former client.
“My daughter did recognize one of the cats. They belonged to a friend of my wife,” Brown told The Daily.
This isn't the first time Brown has run into trouble with the feds.
The Secret Service raided his house in 2009 after someone stole encrypted customer information from a Farm Bureau website, according to WSMV.
No charges were ever brought in that case.
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