 He was arrested in May of that year, and, in July, he pleaded guilty to charges of obstruction of IRS agents and the use of a false Social Security number (officials alleged that he had used four such numbers since 1984 in order to conceal his assets; Bell said that he did not believe anyone had a right to know his real Social Security number).As part of his plea bargain, Bell pleaded guilty in July 1997 to collecting the names and home addresses of IRS employees, and the home addresses of FBI, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents and police in Clark County, Washington; Bell also accepted responsibility for conducting a stinkbomb attack in the Vancouver IRS office.He was convicted of the two low-level felonies and sentenced in December 1997 to eleven months in prison followed by three years of federal probation.