the bottom line is when you use the internet what you did can be traced back to you!!!! three rules. 1) when you go to a web site IT knows where your at! it has to know where your at to send the web page you requested back to you! 2) most web sites keep log files of all the people who visited them. the log files contain the pages you requested and where you came from which is your ip address. 3) the log files there to help the engineers who run the web site diagnose computer problems. but if the cops want to trace you down they will request these log files and as in this case use them to find you! Original Article Digital trail found suspect in death of mother-to-be Matt Sedensky Associated Press Dec. 21, 2004 12:00 AM KANSAS CITY, Mo. - In the end, it wasn't a fingerprint or a blood spatter that led authorities to the woman suspected of strangling a mother-to-be and cutting the baby from her womb. It was an 11-digit computer code. Police zeroed in on Lisa Montgomery in the most 21st century of ways, by trolling computer records, examining online message boards and, most important, tracing an IP address, 65.150.168.223, to a computer at her Melvern, Kan., home. "That in and of itself led us to the home," Jeff Lanza, an FBI spokesman here said of the IP (Internet protocol) address, the unique number given to every Web-connected computer. Investigators say that just before the slaying, Montgomery had corresponded over the Internet with the victim, Bobbie Jo Stinnett, about buying a dog from Stinnett. Montgomery, 36, made a first appearance Monday before a packed courtroom in Kansas City, Kan., where her attorney refused to waive her right to preliminary and identity hearings. Both hearings have been scheduled for Thursday morning. Montgomery is charged with kidnapping resulting in death. Authorities have said Montgomery confessed to the crime. The 4-day-old girl was released from a hospital in Topeka, Kan., on Monday. The suspect's husband, Kevin Montgomery, told reporters that he knew nothing about his wife's suspected actions. He has not been charged with any wrongdoing. "My family has suffered a tragedy, but I am not the only family," he said. "This has to be as hard or harder on them as it is on me. I sure hope they get as much support from their church and community as I have because we are all going to need it." Within hours of Stinnett's killing Thursday at her Skidmore, Mo., home, investigators realized the potential information her computer could hold in finding her killer. Stinnett, 23, raised rat terrier dogs at home and had been expecting a potential customer the afternoon she was killed. In fact, she had to get off the phone with her mother because the customer was at the door, according to investigators. When Stinnett's body was discovered, detectives collected not just physical evidence; they also took her computer. Besides trying to find the killer, investigators were racing against time to find the baby, who was one month premature when she was cut from her mother's belly and, it was feared, may have suffered oxygen loss or other trauma when her mother was strangled. At the lab, clues seemed to pour out of the computer within minutes: who Stinnett had been e-mailing, what sites she had been visiting. Important tips from the public came in, too. Among them: a North Carolina dog breeder pointed to communications on a rat terrier message board. It turned out that at 4:22 p.m. on Wednesday, the day before Stinnett's slaying, someone identifying herself as Darlene Fischer posted a message to the victim on a rat terrier message board. "Please get in touch with me soon as we are considering the purchase of one of your puppies," it said. About an hour later, Stinnett communicated with Fischer for about 20 minutes, investigators said. Then, at 7:44 p.m., Stinnett posted a message to Fischer: "I've e-mailed you with the directions so we can meet. I do so hope that the e-mail reaches you. Great chatting with you on messenger. And do look forward to chatting with you tomorrow a.m." Investigators traced Fischer's IP address back to a dial-up connection from Montgomery's home in Melvern, about 120 miles southwest of Skidmore. On Friday, less than 24 hours after the slaying, investigators found the baby at the home and arrested Montgomery.