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| Former AOL employee Jason Smathers did not have
his guilty plea accepted by the judge. |
A US District Judge has refused to accept a guilty plea from
Jason Smathers, the former AOL employee, suspected of having stolen
92 million email addresses from the ISP and sell their details onto
spammers.
Judge Alvin Hellerstein postponed the hearing until 28 January
2005 as he was not convinced that 24-year-old Smathers had actually
committed a crime under the federal CAN-SPAM legislation that took
effect earlier in 2004.
It was earlier reported that Smathers had made a plea bargain
agreement with prosecutors that would mean he would face a fine
and up to two years in prison.
The judge, who told the court that he had cancelled his own
membership of AOL after he received too much spam, said it was not
clear that Smathers had been guilty of deception - a requirement of
the CAN-SPAM act. He has asked government lawyers to file documents
by 12 January 2005 explaining why Smathers can be prosecuted under
the CAN-SPAM law, and why his conduct was deceptive and not just
fraudulent.
"Everybody hates spamsters, there's no question about that,"
Judge Hellerstein told prosecutors. "I'm not prepared to go ahead..
I need to be independently satisfied that a crime has been
created."
Lawyers for Smathers said there was a chance their client would
withdraw his guilty plea altogether.
"To take effective action in the courtroom against spammers, and
those who support spammers by breaking the law, the right
legislation must be in place and found to be workable," said
Graham Cluley,
senior technology consultant for Sophos. "Although this may appear
to be a strange twist in the case of the 92 million stolen email
addresses, it may help clarify how best to bring to book those
suspected of involvement in spamming in future."
The CAN-SPAM ("Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited
Pornography and Marketing") Act became law in the United States in
January 2004, amongst much criticism that it would not be stringent
enough to have an impact on the activities of many spammers.
Sophos is headquartered in Boston, US and Oxford, UK. More information is available at www.sophos.com.