Adrian Lamo, hacker who turned in Chelsea Manning to FBI, found dead

Adrian Lamo, the notorious computer hacker who turned in Chelsea Manning to the FBI and was arrested for hacking into The New York Times and Microsoft, has died in Kansas at age 37.

Sedgwick County spokeswoman Kate Flavin said Friday that Lamo’s body was at the morgue in Wichita. The Wichita Eagle reported Lamo was found dead in his apartment Wednesday.

Charley Davidson, a Wichita police officer told the media outlet there was “nothing suspicious about his death.” It was not immediately clear how Lamo died.

The computer hacker was living in Wichita for about a year, his friend Lorraine Murphy told the Wichita Eagle. She said she sent Lamo a message in December 2016 asking how he was and he said he was “homeless in Wichita.”

“Adrian was always homeless or on the verge of it,” Murphy said. “He bounced around a great deal, for no particular reason.”

She added: “He was a believer in the Geographic Cure. Whatever goes wrong in your life, moving will make it better. And he knew people all over the country.”

However, Lamo did not make many friends along the way. Murphy said he often received death threats for his hacking.

Davidson said there is “no indication foul play is involved in Lamo’s death.”

Manning, who is transgender and went by Bradley at the time of her arrest, was convicted in 2013 of leaking a trove of classified documents. President Barack Obama commuted her sentence and she was released from military prison in May 2017 after serving seven years of a 35-year sentence.

Following her release, Manning announced in January she has filed to run in Maryland for the seat of Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin.

Lamo testified that Manning contacted him because of his notoriety in the hacking community. He said the two met online after Manning read an article about Lamo, The Guardian reported.

Adrian Lamo was arrested in 2004 for hacking The New York Times and Microsoft.  (Reuters)

He told the British newspaper that he thought about Manning “every day.”

“The decision was not one I decided to make, but was thrust upon me,” he said.

Lamo’s father, Mario, wrote a post on to Facebook mourning the death of his son.

“With great sadness and a broken heart I have to let know all of Adrian’s friends and acquaintances [sic] that he is dead. A bright mind and compassionate soul is gone, he was my beloved son.”

He was convicted of computer fraud after he was arrested in 2004 for hacking The New York Times and Microsoft.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.