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The Wisconsin man spends more than three years in prison for hacking to ring doorbell cameras, then feeds law enforcement in the homes of unsuspecting victims, allowing him to live stream potentially violent conflicts.
Kya Chris Channelson, 23, of Racine, Wisconsin, was sentenced to 44 months in federal prison for participating in a weekly “swatting” incident that occurred nationwide in 2020, including two in Southern California.
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, Nelson and his co-conspirators used previously hacked Yahoo Mail accounts to access doorbell cameras and used the same email and password combo to see if the ring account was associated.
Ring doorbell devices will be seen in Silver Spring, Maryland on August 28, 2019. (Getty Images)
Once logged in, Nelson and his friends called the person’s local law enforcement agency and reported a false emergency to elicit the response of armed police in their home.
After setting the stage for potential law enforcement responses, the group broadcast audio and video from hacked devices on social media and used cameras to disrupt victims and officers on the scene.
In one example, on November 8, 2020, Nelson and another were logged in to the victim’s ring account in West Covina. Spoofing as a young child, they called the West Covina Police Station to report that there was a violent conflict occurring within the home in which parents were involved, adding that there were several guns at the facility and at least seven shots had already been fired.
Armed police responded to the home based on a demacall, and the homeowner was taken from the residence at a muzzle. During that police operation, Nelson used cameras to untie and threaten the corresponding officer, the DOJ said.
A few days later, another swatting incident occurred at his Oxnard home, where Nelson and his friends called the Oxnard Police Station and posed as children, claiming that their father was inside the house with a firearm. A second dema call was made to the police dispatch, reporting the sound of gunshots fired inside the house.
Again, officers respond to the victim’s house at the muzzle and once again, Nelson untook and threaten the police using the home’s ring camera.
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Nelson has been in federal confinement since August 2024, and previously sentenced him to prison for unrelated charges in Kentucky. He pleaded guilty in January to the swatting incident.
One of his conspirators, James Andre McCarty, 22, of Kayenta, Arizona, was sentenced to seven years in federal prison for his role in a ring crime.
McCarty also admitted another incident in Florida. There, he called the local police station, claiming he was a man who had just killed his wife and was holding hostages, and warned him that he had armed him and equipped the house with explosives.
He live streamed the police response on social media and later praised him, saying, “I said I thought it was funny,” DOJ said.
In the sentencing documents, prosecutors described Nelson and his co-conspirators as criminals who “hard digital crimes and terrorized innocent people across the country” while still safe behind the keyboard.
“He put others in real danger,” the prosecutor wrote.
This case was investigated by the FBI.
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