Man Cited in 900-Number Billings : Fraud: An Agoura Hills resident is accused of falsely charging 16,596 San Fernando Valley phone customers.

In what the Secret Service said was the first case of its kind in the nation, the owner of a Canoga Park financial information service has been charged with breaking into telephone company equipment and falsely billing 16,596 San Fernando Valley telephone customers for 900-number calls.

Thomas Anthony Bennett, 29, of Agoura Hills, was arraigned Thursday in federal court in Los Angeles on four felony charges in connection with $785,000 in fake billings in August.

Bennett faces one count each of access device fraud, conspiracy, mail fraud and wire fraud, said Clint L. Howard, Secret Service special agent in charge of the Los Angeles area. Each count carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in federal prison and a $5,000 fine, Howard said.

Bennett was arrested Wednesday after he explained his role in the scam to undercover agents over lunch at a Denny’s Restaurant in Hollywood, Howard said. He was being held without bail at the federal Metropolitan Detention Center in Los Angeles.

The agents, posing as con artists interested in developing a similar scam, were introduced to Bennett by a third party. The undercover agents offered to pay Bennett to tell them his techniques for infiltrating Pacific Bell’s phone system.

“After he explained it to us--and for all practical purposes admitted committing the crime--we arrested him,” Howard said.

Bennett used an alias, Anthony Stevens, when he signed a contract for AT&T;’s MultiQuest 900 service, Howard said. Bennett then set up Financial Tech, a company that gave stock quotes and financial information at $50 per call.

Bennett then broke into a Pacific Bell facility, which Howard would not identify, on several occasions and manipulated the switching system so that customers in an eight-square-mile area in the West Valley were billed for unmade calls to his 900 number, Howard said.

Irate customers who tried to track down Financial Tech found the company’s address was a post office box in Canoga Park.

“The problem was brought to the phone company’s attention by curious customers,” said AT&T; spokesman Holly Echols. “None of our customers were out any money and he did not receive money--not one red cent, because we detected the fraud and shut the service and suspended the payment.”

AT&T; bills customers on behalf of the independent companies that operate 900 numbers. Rates are set by the companies, which pay a fee to AT&T; for processing and billing each call.

“It’s the first 900-number scam that we’ve ever done. To my knowledge it’s the first one ever nationwide,” Howard said. “People are always coming up with new crimes.”