WASHINGTON - A federal grand jury has indicted the son of a Tennessee state legislator in the hacking of the email account of Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin.
David Kernell, 20, of Knoxville, Tenn., the son of state Democratic Representative Mike Kernell, is scheduled to be arraigned later Wednesday.
Mike Kernell has said he had nothing to do with the hacking incident.
A statement from the U.S. Justice Department says Kernell was indicted Tuesday by a federal grand jury in Knoxville for intentionally accessing without authorization the email account of the Alaska's governor.
Kernell, an economics major at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville.
If convicted, he faces a maximum of five years in prison, a $250,000 fine and a three-year term of supervised release.
The indictment alleges that on Sept. 16 he reset the password to Palin's personal email account to gain access to it.
Authorities say David Kernell then read the contents of the account and made screenshots of the email directory, email content and other personal information, later posting some of the information to a public website.
