The network admin who froze up San Francisco City's network has had most of the hacking charges against him dropped. A judge has dismissed most of the charges against a former San Francisco network administrator accused of hijacking the city's computer network he designed and maintained.

Terry Childs was convinced he was about to be fired “for poor performance” so he wired up the network so that no one could use it without his password. Police locked him up and the network slowly went dark until the Mayor approached Childs in his cell to ask for the password. Childs faced three charges of tampering with the network and a lone charge of denying city authorities access to the network.

San Francisco Superior Court Judge Kevin McCarthy on Friday tossed three tampering charges. The case is starting to look like the courts are beginning to believe Child's arguments. His case was that he only wired up the network in such a way to prevent people he thought were idiots from firing him and stuffing up his work. He was also accused of electronically spying on his supervisors and their attempt to fire him.

Childs' attorney has claimed that there was no destructive intent and that Childs was merely protecting the network from incompetent city officials who were trying to force him out of his job.