Las Vegas, Nevada - Definitely don't try this at home or at work. Joseph Morgan was dissatisfied with what he believes is workplace favoritism. Like many employees who have had to face being on the wrong end of a managers good favor, Morgan thought to do something about it and expose the favoritism. Perhaps taking a page out of the Obama-NSA playbook, he eavesdropped on private voice conversations between Ruben Aquino, his Chief Investigator at the Taxicab Authority, and Antoine Rivers, a fellow investigator.

Do the Ends Justify the Means?

Morgan got the proof he wanted. He was able to show the chief investigator displaying blatant favoritism and even fabricating numbers relative to their line of work. He then e-mailed his findings. It isn't clear to whom he e-mailed them, but it was clear to the attorney general that he violated the law and has now been charged with one count of surreptitious intrusion of privacy by listening device and another count for interception of wire communication.

In grand jury testimony, Aquino said he either received a phone call from Morgan and forgot to hang up or did not realize he had the phone one while engaging in private conversation with another employee. Aquino did not realize that Morgan remained on the other line recording the conversation with his cell phone. At issue is that Morgan did not notify both parties he was recording the conversation. However, as anyone can deduce, no one would allow another to record them fabricating numbers for their employer. The illegal pseudo-wiretap occurred on December 11, 2012.

Smoking Gun Fades Away

There is no doubt that Morgan had stumbled onto the proverbial smoking gun. In one conversation, Rivers is said to tell Chief Inspector Aquino that he "showed him the money" at which point he requested he too be "shown the money". Rivers had recently received a promotion by the chief. In addition, their conversation revealed that the "Business and Industry" Agency of the Year award recently received was based on fabricated numbers.

One other investigator involved in the wiretap was James Dudley. He was concerned about the legalities of the 37-minute phone conversation and addressed those concerns with an attorney who told him it was legal given that neither party had terminated the phone call. For his part, Morgan has been disciplined by the chief inspector and was likely in self-preservation mode. He is said to have taken personal offense at hearing his chief inspector discuss his upcoming internal investigation with a fellow employee. Despite efforts by local channel News 3 to get the current status of Morgan's internal investigation and employment status, the Department of Business and Industry refused to disclose the information citing it lacked permission to disclose those details.

At this point, the only certainty is that Morgan has become the focus of investigators. While he did capture explosive information, it was done illegally and the attorney general has not decided whether Aquino or Rivers will face an investigation of their own.