Former St. Louis Cardinals Scouting Director Chris Correa Sentenced to 46 Months in Prison

The St. Louis Cardinals’ former scouting director will spend 46 months in federal custody for hacking the Houston Astros’ database.

Former St. Louis Cardinals scouting director Chris Correa was sentenced Monday to 46 months in jail after pleading guilty to five counts of computer hacking in January.

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Last summer, an FBI investigation was opened into allegations of the Cardinals’ front office hacking into the Houston Astros’ scouting database back in 2013, and after Correa was found to be the primary offending party in July, he was dismissed by the organization.

According to Dan Graf of FOXSports.com

, Correa will only actually serve half of his sentence behind bars, as he’ll have two years of “supervised release”, but he’ll pay $279,038.65 in fines.

Reports from an article by the New York Times’ Tyler Kepner this January indicated that Correa sought revenge against Astros GM Jeff Luhnow, the man who brought him into the Cardinals’ organization back in 2009, but departed to become Houston’s GM in December of 2011. After discovering Luhnow’s password–or a password of one of the other Cardinals personnel employees that defected to Houston with Luhnow–in the Cardinals’ database, Correa was able to slightly alter the password and discover a pathway into Houston’s database, known as “Ground Control.”

Correa reportedly hacked the Astros database numerous times, examining the organization’s notes on recently-drafted players, potential draftees, international prospects, and on trade discussions that had occurred in advance of the deadline.

The Cardinals’ Chairman and CEO, Bill DeWitt, Jr., released a statement on the situation on Monday afternoon:

"“While today’s sentencing of Chris Correa marks the end of the Government’s investigation, we also understand that the Office of the Commissioner of Baseball will now conduct its own investigation of this matter.  As we did with the Government during its investigation, we intend to fully cooperate with the Commissioner’s Office in connection with its investigation so that this matter can finally be resolved.  Pending the outcome of the Commissioner’s investigation, we will have no further comment.”"

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According to Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports and MLB Network, the league office is now expected to proceed with discipline of the Cardinals:

Whether that means draft picks are docked, international signing money is deducted, or some type of disciplinary action is taken against Cardinals GM John Mozeliak, it should be interesting to see what the league decides. With a new CBA expected to come into play this winter that could drastically affect the draft and international signing procedures, perhaps the league will wait just a bit longer so that the penalty matches up with any new rules that may come into play.