man arrested on spam charges

Thursday 11 December, 2003 at 11:47PM (Nereus) :: permalink :: comments (8)

Good news. This story featured on AOL news today:

Virginia Attorney General Jerry Kilgore has announced the nation's first felony charges and arrest for sending spam. Using Virginia's new Anti-Spam law, a grand jury indicted Jeremy Jaynes (a.k.a., "Jeremy James" and "Gaven Stubberfield"), regarded as the eighth-worst spam distributor in the world (rated according to the anti-spam watchdog group Spamhaus).

Law enforcement authorities arrested Jaynes in Raleigh, North Carolina, and charged him with four felony counts of using fraudulent means to transmit unsolicited bulk e-mail. If convicted, Jaynes could face up to 20 years in prison and $10,000 in fines; the four felony charges each carry punishment of one to five years in prison, a fine of up to $2,500, or both.

Kilgore told a news conference that officials were in negotiations for the surrender of a second man, Richard Rutowski, on the same charges. Spam has grown from a minor annoyance to a major threat to the stability of the Internet, experts say, and now makes up more than half of all e-mail traffic.

At least 36 states currently have some sort of spam law on the books, and President Bush is expected to sign the first national measure into law as early as next week.

Some states like California and Utah already require online marketers to get explicit permission before sending e-mail, although I can see where that could lead - we'll just get spammed by emails asking if the sender can spam us. heh. Either that or the source will move offshore like so many other businesses.

Good to see anyway, I hope these spammers get what they deserve. If you've ever tried clicking on their links to remove yourself from their lists, 9 times out of 10 the website is conveniently unavailable, the other 1 time out of 10 removes you from that list and adds you to 5 other lists instead. Bunch of assholes should not even be allowed near the internet, either directly or indirectly. They should be castrated as well. And have bamboo shoots stuck under their fingernails. Twice in each fingernail. And their toenails. All 10 of them. Yeah.

comments (8)

Haroeris
December 12, 2003 8:51 PM [link]

I do remember reading about this - I still find it hilarious

Erin
December 13, 2003 9:48 PM [link]

I hope this works better than the idea that came about for telemarketers... we still get those calls. *sigh

Haroeris
December 14, 2003 9:42 AM [link]

Well, there is another rest you could post about

Jim
December 14, 2003 2:11 PM [link]

Do you happen to know where I could find information about this bill that President Bush is allegedly going to sign?

Nereus
December 14, 2003 2:57 PM [link]

try this link
http://www.infoworld.com/article/03/11/24/HNantispamvote%20_1.html

kim
December 25, 2003 12:36 AM [link]

spam is annoying, but no one should have to serve up to 20 years in prison. quit bitching!!!!!!! get the murders off the street and give mr. jaynes a slap on the wrist and fine him

Nereus
December 25, 2003 3:41 AM [link]

Actually yeah, you're right about getting murderers etc, and perhaps the punishment should fit the crime. The spammers do it to make money, so the punishment should be heavy fines, in fact the fine should be every single $ they ever earned from spamming multiplied by 2.

And the bamboo under the fingernails thing too, of course.

Kari
May 4, 2005 5:57 AM [link]

yeah !! kill 'em all!!