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Siblings Guilty of Spam Felony, Partner Acquitted
saikou writes "According to AP Story (via SF Chronicle), brother and sister spammers just got convicted 'in the nation's first felony prosecution of distributors of spam,' while third suspect was acquitted. Jurors moved on to figuring out appropriate punishment (please, please, please give them some jail time. Pretty please). More spam cases for Virgina?"
Goes to the slammer together.
Prosecutors did ask the jury to impose a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison for Jaynes, and to consider an unspecified prison term for his sister.
However like the article already mentioned, jurors who convicted Jeremy D. Jaynes, 30, and Jessica DeGroot, 28, later sentenced Jaynes to a nine-year prison term and fined DeGroot $7,500 for three convictions each of sending e-mails with fraudulent and untraceable routing information.
Now it's a matter of protecting/preserving those sentences because the defending lawyer claims the prison term is an excessive punishment, given that this is the first prosecution under the Virginia law. He also noted that his client, a North Carolina resident, would have been unaware of the Virginia law. If they dare to appeal, prosecutors should appeal to increase the prison term to the maximum too!
--
Play iCLOD Virtual City Explorer and win Half-Life 2
Rock that crushes, Paper & Scissors that don't matter.
More spam cases for Virgina?
Can't slashdot include an automatic spell-checker?
A few years back, a guy stole a truckload of spam from a Hormel factory and got convicted of several felonies including distrubiting stolen spam.
Preferably, time in federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison.
I support the Center for Consumer Freedom
I find it insane the amount of internet bandwidth that spam consumes. The harder we crack down on this sort of thing the less of a problem we will have. In sinapore a fellow got whipped with a cane a few times when he spray painted a car; I bet he won't be doing it again any time soon.
What ? Don't you think there are other crimes that deserve such a real punishment ? Spam is easily filtered with spamassassin and friends (I should know, it gets rid of thousands of spams daily for me), jail should be for murderers, rapers, corrupted politicians, etc.
What are governments outside the US doing to enforce Anti-Spam regulation? Can anyone give me some info on that?
My sons email account has 3 spanish language spams this morning - I guess someone thinks he speaks spanish... but it made me wonder if the spam lords are shifting their focus to other countries to pedal their wares. It is a global marketplace, after all.
You said "jail time". Is that some sort of newfangled lawyer shorthand for "go all Vlad-the-Impaler on them in front of Genuity or Verio headquarters pour encourager les autres?"
Because if all you mean is "locked in a small room, given free room and board for a few years, subject only to the occasional prison rape", then you'd better make yourself scarce. This here's Slashdot, and we don't take kindly to yuppified murketeering types who publicly express sympathy for spammers 'round these parts.
Is the editor seriously advocating jail time for spamming? I'm all for punishment, but I think taking every piece of property and dime of wealth is going to make a much bigger impact than sending them to a place that fosters the criminal mentality rather than reforming it. Reserve jail for hardcore felons that perform a physically harmful crime to someone else.
The credit card orders make this definitely a fraud case, but if that same punishment was applicable without the fraud... I can't lookup the law as the article doesn't mention it, but I'm very afraid.
SIG: HUP
Because they're a bunch of nutballs who want to plan their riots in private. Why do you even want to go that site? To make fun of those losers?
"If a frog had side pockets, he'd carry a hand gun" - Dan Rather
One hopes that this will have an effect, if not deterring, at least taking one offender out of the equation(if jailed/executed).
This tidbit was less promising: "Prosecutors compared Jaynes and DeGroot, both of the Raleigh, N.C., area, to modern-day snake-oil salesmen who used the Internet to peddle junk like a 'FedEx refund processor' that supposedly allowed people to earn $75 an hour while working from home."
People are still biting on frauds of all sort, and the internet has become the prime location for it.
There is no real solution to stupidity, at least until designer babies are a reality.
http://persianews.on.nimp.org/?u=Tar_Baby
She has a cute Virgina.
While I sympathize with the cries of "Off with their heads", I don't think jail time is really appropriate in this case. I think we need to save our prisons for people who have done something Really Bad, not something Really Annoying.
The whole idea of "lock 'em up and throw away the key" has been beaten into our heads by politicians playing on our fears. So we automatically suggest spammers go to jail with other terrible offenders, like the guy who got caught with a baggie of wacky weed at a Grateful Dead cover band's show.
Make the punishment fit the crime. Big financial penalty, to make up for the bandwidth they wasted. I'd like to see direct reimbursement of the victims, but if you really sent the guy $39.95 for a stupid get-rich-quick scheme, maybe you're better off with the life lesson instead of the cash.
Or kill two birds with one stone(r). Punish the "criminal" potheads and the spammers at the same time. Send nonviolent drug-related parolees to the spammers' house on a regular (but unpredictable) schedule to hit them up for money for weed.
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
Now that I have mentioned it, I trust Slashdotters will elaborate on the porn possibilities.
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
Thanks for the hint. I'm pretty much ready to participate in all-out riots after this election result.
"Jurors who convicted Jeremy D. Jaynes, 30, and Jessica DeGroot, 28, later sentenced Jaynes to a nine-year prison term and fined DeGroot $7,500"
They both should be given EQUAL jail time, and especially at the range...9 years of jail versus 7500? please!
(\_/)
(O.o) This is Bunny. Add Bunny to your signature
(> <) to help him achieve world domination.
(please, please, please give them some jail time. Pretty please)
15 years of ass rape in a maximum security prison is not a fitting punishment.
Maybe 30 or 90 days in county jail and a million dollar fine would be more like it.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
On one hand, I see 9 years in jail for sending nuisance email as excessive punishment, but on the other, they were making money committing fraud.
Since, however, they were tried simply on sending spam and NOT fradulent sales, I find this very disturbing. If the law they were being tried on was sending junk mail, does the content of the mail actually matter under this law? Why would the judge allow that information to be even considered?
It's kind of like trying someone for stealing a car, and saying it's a worse crime because he had a crack rock in his pocket. Unless the law stipulated stronger punishment for having drugs in a stolen car, it should be left out of the case.
I mean I know spam is bad and all (especially the nasty jellied covering) but dang isn't this a bit extreme? And what about the grocery stores, what will we do when they all go under???
I Am My Own Worst Enemy
What a pity Hannibal Lecter is a character in a movie. I'm pretty sure that an appropriate sentence should involve him, and a bottle of chianti.
See what I've been reading.
(please, please, please give them some jail time. Pretty please)
RTFA, submitter. The dude got 9 years.
-R
"three convictions each of sending e-mails with fraudulent and untraceable routing information."
So much for untraceable...pwned!
(\_/)
(O.o) This is Bunny. Add Bunny to your signature
(> <) to help him achieve world domination.
we should hand them over to those Iraqi militants, and tell them they are important USA government agents...
According to the article "In one month alone, Jaynes received 10,000 credit card orders, each for $39.95". These are the people who need to be slapped. They are making spamming and scamming profitable. I'm sorry, but losing 40 bucks isn't enough punishment for this.
But why is the rum gone?
If you read the article, this really was a case about FRAUD. The sentences were handed down heavily because they defrauded people of almost $40k. Spam just happened to be the medium they chose to do it in.
I really doubt that, had these folks run a legit business and didn't defraud people, that they'd have gotten such heavy sentences..
Anthony Papillion
Advanced Data Concepts, Inc.
"Quality Custom Software and IT Services"
They are well known supporters of spamn! They have taken hundreds of thousands of dollars from spammers.
What about theft? The total costs of spam are enormous, even without scams. Many, many millions of dollars per year.They suck up bandwidth and disk space, and waste millions of person-hours each year that could have bene used for something productive.
They steal bandwidth. They steal disk space. They steal our time, and time costs dearly. You can't replace it.
So until you can find a way to force them to pay restitution to everyone they've robbed, don't try to paint them as harmless.
Now add in scammers, pornographers, and all the other crap, and they deserve much, much worse than they're getting. What, you don't think porn matters? When it gets into my house, in front of me, or my wife, or my kids, it damn well matters. If you try to walk into my house and expose us to porn, you might very well leave in an ambulance if you aren't awfully quick on your feet.
Ten years in the electric chair should suffice.
How about another cliche?
In one month alone, Jaynes received 10,000 credit card orders, each for $39.95, for the processor.
In other words, stupid is as stupid does.
10,000 people fell for it. Isn't that rather depressing? Ok, we probably saw vote counts for the election and wondered how so many people could be so wrong, but 10,000 people trying to order something for $40 advertised in spam, that tells you this isn't exactly a nation of rocket scientists.
You can't seriously fight spam until people stop being so damn stupid.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Why, yes! Of course I want a FREE IPOD!
go for it make sure to take a swing at the cops in riot gear, they love it!
"If a frog had side pockets, he'd carry a hand gun" - Dan Rather
ain't gonna get much of that where he's going...
Ordered to eat SPAM for all meals for the next 9 years.
Well, my experience has been that spam cases have to do with Penis.
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
A prosecutor can't aim for a higher sentence on appeal, it's against the law. Every criminal defendant has a due process right to have his or her conviction reviewed by an appellate court. If the prosecutor could go for a greater penalty on appeal, it would be an unfair burden on the exercise of the right.
--AC
We all get unwelcome mail in our inboxes. They will soon be getting something unwelcome in their outboxes
Considering the crimes involved (not just spam but fraud), and that all the defendents made millions (and the property records prove it), it's damn sad that one got off completely and pne that was convicted got only 3 "fines" of $2500 each. She must be laughing here head off now.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Spammer's have made my life miserable, but I am not willing to let them force me off the net. I have my own domain, primarily for e-mail, I will not allow the spammer's to win. I have spam filtering, I use Spamcop for those that get past the filters, I have Sendmail setup to use block lists.
The net result, in 6 months, my e-mail server has blocked ~3000 to 4000 spams a day at the MTA level with blocklists. That doesn't account for the thousands that Bayesian filters and other filters take care of that don't get blocked by the MTA and block lists. That also doesn't account for the 50+ a day that still get through, which do get reported via Spamcop. With all of the filtering and blocking that I have setup my e-mail is still inundated. I should not have to, as it's been suggested, change my e-mail addresses, this is my identity on the net, that would be like asking me to change my name.
Spammer's are scum and should be treated as such.
I personally don't think the penalty was harsh enough. Lock them up and throw away the room.
Truly, I feel they should be barred from ever using a computer again for the rest of their lives.
The U.S. pretends that it's system of justice is somehow too civilized to allow caneing like Singapore does, but I question that.
Caneing is quite aversive to the criminal. I can't imagine they'll decide they don't mind being caned again. Unlike prison, it doesn't further alienate the criminal by re-socializing them to a prison environment, then expect them to be well adjusted members of society when released (or rather pretend to expect).
Given the things that are allowed (sometimes encouraged) to happen in prison and the minimal to non-existant corrective measures, it's easily more barbaric than a caneing and certainly more expensive.
Summary, take away the spoils of their crime and cane them.
And how many years did the Enron execs get? btw Bushs friends too.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
If the conviction is thrown out and a new jury re-convicts you, the court can and pretty much must ignore the previous sentence.
If the defendants appeal their conviction and win but don't get the case dismissed, they could get the maximum if they are convicted in a future trial.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Yes, I do believe they should be jailed for property crimes.
What is to deter them? Just like oil companies, they are fined a fee that doesn't equate to a penny on the dollar for what they are raking in. That isn't even a slap on the wrist and is not even a deterrant for doing the crime.
I hate to say it, yes even as a Texan, a few examples must be made. And while I do not believe in the death penalty, I believe that spammers and anyone that writes/promotes or profits in anyway whatsoever spyware/malware/adware should be shot. Any time you spend feeling the guilt towards those individuals will be spent cleaning up the messes they've made.
A long jail sentence is excessive.
Two years in jail and 15 years of being forced to use the address "myname@convictedspammer.va.us" for all your email is an appropriate punishment.
Even sweeter - you have to use a 110bps teletype to access your mail.
Since trash is trash, for community service, you can clean up trash along the highways.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
These people are being punished for annoying AOHell. Ordinary con men don't get 9 year in prison. There's not enough room there for violent people as is. Con men come and go from jail, till they flunk the three time loser limit. With so many ordinary frauds walking the street you have to wonder what this case represents. This is more AOHell flexing it's muscles than it is public outrage and it's unlikely to protect ordinary citizens.
I got to learn a lot about ordinary con men when one defrauded my mother in law's business. He burned her, her suppliers and her customers with bogus charges and every other manner or fraud in the few months he worked there, including a few spiteful last minute things like putting a chain of paperclips into the fax machine. He almost put her out of business and cost lots of people much more than he pocketed himself. The bozo ended up in jail for some other fraud he'd been involved in, but never spent more than a few months in jail. He'd been doing that kind of thing all his life, but he always gets out of jail and moves on. You can't level fines on the loser because he never has any savings. It's disgusting, but the damage such people do is not great enough for there to be widespread public knowledge and outrage.
Nine years in prison is the kind of punishment doled out by a company with Time Warner money and influence. It's much like the RIAA file sharing cases, where the victim loses their life savings as a "settlement". Sure, those people don't deserve the fines and frauds do, but there are a lot of other frauds that have yet to be punished. I'd like to see fraud taken more seriously but when it comes time to build more jails, AOL controlled media will remind us how expensive that is and nothing will change. Ordinary fraud does not harm big business, in fact it helps reduce start ups and other competition, so it will not be fought seriously.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
put 'em in a cell with a guy who's taken one too many enlargement pills.
One of the biggest problems here is that the guy's sentence is clearly based on his gender.
Violate law while male = 9 years violate law while female = $7500 fine
Is it somehow not as bad to get ripped off by a woman?
This is more than a simple case of sending SPAM, since it also involved fraud (selling "Fed-Ex Refund Processors," or some such BS), on the order of $400,000, and the perpetrators certainly deserve jail time. However, anyone who sent SPAM, even for a legitimate business (and I use the term loosely) could be prosecuted under this law. While I agree that SPAM is probably the single biggest example of wasted bandwidth, I don't think it should result in imprisonment. Virginia's AG seemed pretty proud about having such a tough law on the books though, which is representative of the state's mentality overall. I know many people who've been locked up for minor (traffic) infractions in Virginia. One one occasion after being pulled over, I was told to exit my car at gunpoint and my vehicle was thoroughly searched. Of course there was nothing to find -- the extent of my criminal conduct is downloading a few MP3s and a few speeding/parking tickets. Their tough justice approach to the most minor of offenses is reminiscent of a police state. For some reason the population there thinks the state is going to hell in a handbasket, and most people seem to live in a state of suspicion/paranoia about everything and everyone around them. They seem to think that a young redneck listening to hip hop means their smalltown community is a step away from turning into South Central LA. And that's why I left.
Oh yeah, Prison abuse isn't unheard of there either.
This is silly, they are considering the motivation. These people can afford computers so they are not starving therefore any crime of a financial nature by these people is pure greed.
There are alternative justifications for crimes such as rape.
Some people take those crimes increadibly personally, (which may be a sideeffect of the propaganda used to discourage negative behavior).
Spammers are engaging in an utterly destructive and antisocial crime, their chances of rehabilitation using common methods is almost nill.
If it were possible to have a perfect determination of the antisocial motivation of an individual spammer the penalty should be INCREADIBLY harsh.
If you really want them to suffer. Tell US agencies they are terrorists/islamiacs/camel jockeys. This would be worse for them. I, for one, think prison or jail for such a felony is only appropriate if one is caught for the second time. And even then 2 years should be more than enough. A high fine will keep most from doing it again.
Martha Stewart is doing xx? months of federal prison time for reacting to what someone told her in order to save money that was hers, so I don't think 9 years is too much for this case. While spam might not seem worth 9 years to someone else, I prefer to look at it and estimate how much of a negative impact this person is having on society as a whole. With this view in mind, spamming millions is more of a negative drain than beating someone bloody and cutting off one of their fingers. Sending them to prison probably saves American society more than it costs to hold them there and is a great deterent for other spammers. Anyone who sends spam obviously knows how much people hate it. To me, stealing time is no different than stealing property.
I hate to say it, yes even as a Texan, a few examples must be made
Gasp...I always thought Texans were the liberal type!
No, that was SPAM, not spam... :-)
It would be much less costly and more productive to garnish any income that these people make for a good long time. There is no justice in locking them up. It's vengence, pure and simple. You like to "make examples" of people, not for justice. You just like to hurt people, and you're looking for a way to justify it. Just because the corporations are treated with kidd gloves doesn't make necessary to jail individuals for spamming. Maybe we should lock people up for rolling through stop signs, no matter how deserted the intersection. Again, anytime the subject of spamming comes up, reasonable thought is thrown out the window. It's like discussing the middle east. The mods have proven that. Your attitude is the same as that of the whacko christians towards gays, and is based on hate, not justice.
What?
Because Christ knows there's plenty of room. And make sure you're humane to everyone. And make sure you have enough guards, but don't pay them more than minimum wage because we need to increase social security and welfare.
If you RTFA, you'll see that the spammer also committed fraud. He received 10,000 credit card numbers ordering a $39.95 so-called "FedEx refund processor" that would enable people to sit at home and make money with their computer. The guy could have made $400,000 from fake junk.
This is him - he used the name Gaven Stubberfield.
dejagoo search link
He deserves at least the 9 years they gave him.
I believe the victims of crime are entitled to restitution. What implication does this have for these spammers? Making them figure out how to pay each of their recipients 1/200 of a cent sounds fair. Once they figure this out maybe we can reverse it for the micropayment problem.
Yeah, and please let violent murderers like Orenthal James Simpson go free so they can get back to playing golf.
PRIORITIES, people, PRIORITIES.
And of course, if the fraud was what it sounds like, those $39.95 make-money-fast kits tell their customers how to be spammers themselves, so they not only annoy millions of people when trolling for those 10,000 suckers, but those suckers will go on to annoy millions more people.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Bubba: What're y'in for, kid?
... *gulp* ... nah, but I can get you a nice deal on an interest-only mortgage...
Jeremy: Lotsa stuff - Viagra, mostly.
Bubba: Viagra? You mean "V14gr4"?
Jeremy: Yeah, that's right. And porn, I did a lot of porn.
Bubba: Pr0n, huh? Got any on ya? I could even use an "18+thumbnail" about now. This place makes even somethin' like you look good.
Jeremy: Nah
Bubba: MORTGAGES! Come here, you sunnabitch, I knew I didn't like yer looks!
Jeremy: Guards! Help!!!
Guard: Yeah, *yawn* I'll be right there. Right after I clean out my 'caughtspam' folder.
sigs, as if you care.
Have to say it -- has anyone else noticed that all the spammers (in the US, at least) are from red states?
Spam costs the world many millions of dollars in lost time, wasted bandwidth, and paying for services to deal with it. On top of that, most spam is in some way fraudulent. Some of it (that this spammer was apparently guilty of) was porn sent to children's email accounts.
Perhaps each individual message isn't much of a problem in and of itself, but when taken in aggrigate, the millions of messages he sent cost thousands of bucks to business and individuals. Children were exposed to things that their parents didn't want them to see. People were conned out of money and who knows what their credit card numbers were used for!
Perhaps when you think of it like this, you will see the beach rather than the individual grains of sand and realize that this man, and his accomplices are CRIMINALS and that the outrage isn't that he got a lengthy sentence but that the other escaped with too light of a fine.
Perhaps that last part is conjecture on my part, I do not know as well as the court what her role was in this criminal enterprise. But I find myself wishing that they were prosicuted under the RICO act.
Say thanks to John Levine, who served as expert witness in this trial. He runs abuse.net, the spam information and reporting service.
-russ
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
Appeals courts generally rule 3 ways on an issue:
1) they rule for the prosecution
2) they rule for the defendant, which typically results in a "do-over"
3) they rule for the defendant and order the case dismissed with prejudice - the defendant is off the hook.
Here's an example of #2 that could result in a longer sentence:
If, after the trial, the defendant's attorney was found to have progressive dementia, but nobody knew it during the trial.
The appeal court would rule he did not have competent counsel, and order a new trial.
If the new jury convicts, the judge at the 2nd trial can impose a sentence as if the 1st trial never happened. Hopefully, with competent counsel, the jury will aquit or the sentence will be shorter.
About 10 years ago in Denver, a man was arrested as he staggered out of a meat-packer's warehouse with a heavy box of meat. It turned out to be beef rectums.
Oh, I wish I were an Oscar Mayer wiener...
rj
Generally sex with a minor is counted on a per-instance (or per person at least) basis. So if you were indecently involved with one minor, one count, with more than one, two counts, etc.
With spam, instances could be counted in the millions, or at least thousands. You could do it 4+ ways:
a) # of individual recipients
b) # of actual emails sent
c) # of different types of spam sent
d) # of different instances spam sent (assuming it isn't constant non-stop)
So really, the cumulative penalties to spammers, if applied in an appropriate manner, could be very large indeed
Though there may not be much of a rehabilitory value in jailing someone, taking away their liberty because they took advantage of someone else's ignorance (thereby affecting the victim's pursuit of happiness), is justice.
Garnish wages? Hell, all they have to do is fireup another scam to help compensate for that.
It's not hate. It's sanity.
An internal system operation returned the error "The operation completed successfully.".
I was about to say "did anybody else read that as 'Viagra'", but then I read it properly.
Cases?? of 'virgina'??? I'm there!
I sure hope posession isn't illegal like the distribution is. I've got a mega stash dude
- Thomas;
___ This sig is in boldface to emphasize its importance!
plus, the bro and sis get Prozac and everyone else gets penis enlargements and Viagra!
Do they have internet access from jail?
I'll show you mine if you'll show me yours.
It may not have anything to do with being male. The Washington Times says a third defendant, Richard Rutowski, was acquitted, even though he had frequently changed IP addresses for Jaynes. It sounds like the prosecution only proved that DeGroot (the sister) purchased the domain names Jaynes used and couldn't prove that Rutowski knew he was helping send spam when he bought a mailbox for Jaynes. Of course, either might have done far more, but it was Jaynes they were able to pin for sending 100,000 emails in a day and for having $24 million in assets.
-- SYS 64738 --
You people are totally obscene. "Hey, we didn't actually shoot the messenger, we only stole nine years of his life. See, we didn't like the message he was bringing!"
If the guy defrauded people, convict him for that. There are plenty of honest ways to sell people something useless for $40 without fraud; Microsoft and preachers both have it down.
Convicting him for sending email is a direct First Amendment violation. He communicated, you didn't like the communication, so off to jail he goes. The spam mail wasn't even anonymous -- there was SOME way to contact him, otherwise all the morons wouldn't have had any way to send him their $39.95. Is it really worth 9 years in prison because his contact info was in the message body rather than in the header? And what happened to the Slashdotters who love anonymous wireless Internet and anonymous P2P and anonymous untraceable web access? Do your principles stop at port 25? Or do you just not have any principles?
If society is lucky, this accused emailer will have stashed away some of his alleged millions, to pay some lawyers to uphold fundamental rights for all of us (and himself). If society is unlucky, then somebody like EFF or ACLU will have to spend your contributions to uphold all of our rights, with him as the test case. If society is really unlucky, then nobody will challenge it, and we'll have mob rule, where merely pissing off a few million people is enough to get you thrown behind bars. And that won't make it a friendly country for somebody like me (who tells off both the government and the citizens when they deserve it) to live in.
As I recall, his response was: "I can't believe I'm going to jail for a bunch of assholes." (Or maybe it was G. Gordon Liddy who said that. I forget.)
/. If the government wants us to respect the law, it should set a better example.
"First off, there's no "MIGHT" about it. He's a spammer,"
I didn't say he DIDN'T send SOMEONE a spam. I stated that he might have sent YOU a spam message. People around here were saying "Lock him up throw away the key" but they probably never got a spam from him.
"Secondly, committing a crime and getting caught has consequences. "
No shit. I just don't think 9 years is appropriate for the crime.
"I'm stunned to see how soft-hearted many of the Slashdot folks here are. He's not going to be tortured, he's not going to be wallowing in the worst conditions"
He's going to be in JAIL. He won't be able to leave. I don't care how fluffy you make this out to be, prison is crap no matter where it is.
"After one or two years he'll be paroled to make room for someone else."
So what is it then? Do you think he deserves a nine year sentence or a one year sentence? I don't think it matter how long it will be before a likely paroll. His crime was non-violent, and it only theoretically hurt people in the pocketbook. Companies.
"I'm stunned to see how soft-hearted many of the Slashdot folks here are."
I'm stunned that someone believes that nine years for sending spam messages is fair. It's cruel and unusual punishment.
I hate this spammer. He should pay. But what the hell? Nine years for annoying people? Shit, we'd all be in jail for life is annoying people was a crime.
- It's not the Macs I hate. It's Digg users. -
When the punishment is extreme and doesn't fit the crime, of course it's a product of hate. It's also part of the desire of control over others. "You will obey me or go to jail." It's cruel, but not unusual(especially in the US).
Garnish wages? Hell, all they have to do is fireup another scam to help compensate for that.
Nonsense. They can be closely monitored.
What?
(Then again, maybe we don't really want to know).
About the word "if": If bullfrogs had wings, they wouldn't bounce around on their little green butts.
of jail time for these two.
"A one-in-a-million shot isn't a big deal if you've got 20million bullets."
These people probably sent out 20-100million spams.. that means that the response rate was between 1/2000 and 1/10,000.
Add in that some of these people were desparate not stupid. Desparate people will sometimes do illogical things and try long-shots that seem stupid to us. When nothing else seems to be working, it really is a logical thing to do.
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
Grand theft in California is stealing anything over $400. It is a felony and as such is punishable by time in state prison. Other states I'm sure have grand theft statutes, although the threshold amount will vary.
Society has long ago recognized that stealing is unacceptable and jail/prison time is not too harsh a sentence.
Personally, I've spent at least 40 hours last year dealing with the company's spam. Not to mention the amount of time dealing with my own spam. All that time adds up.
People and companies are sick and tired of being stolen from with no way to fight back. Well now we can! 12 jurors sentenced this man. That's 12 people who don't think the penalty is too harsh.
If you really want to get technical, multiply the hours you spend on spam by an hourly rate, divide it by the amount of spam you receive, and arrive at a cost per spam number. Multiply that by the amount of spam a spammer sends... if it's over $400, then it's at least as bad as grand theft.
As with many things in society, there is some barrier/level at which 'getting tougher' doesn't do any good, just as there is a barrier of taxes people will endure, after which (if augmented beyond that point) people will search more to avoid it at any costs, instead of paying more (to the detriment of the government which sometimes seem to think more tax equals more income).
Anyway, the idea that giving disproportionate sentences will somehow act as a deterent for others really isn't substantiated by anything. The same argument is made about the death penalty in the USA, also without a shred of evidence it actually helps one iota (but with the major drawback that you run the posibility of killing innocent people).
In ancient china, there once was an emperor who had the same idea, and he took it to the full extreme: anyone convicted of a crime would be beheaded, together with his whole family in the 4th degree. Such draconian measures would surely avoid any crime, because anyone commiting a crime would know dozens of his kin would be killed, right?
Wrong.
As far as historians can tell, crime was commited as frequently before and after then during that period. Not really surprising, since crime-statistics show that, even in comparison, there are slightly fewer crimes in europe *without* death penalty, then in the USA.
I dislike the 'give them as much as you can' policy in the legal arena. It's nothing more then thinly disguised revenge and a feeling of holier-then-thee. It's portrayed as an effective measure to 'scare off' others, while the fact of the matter is, that there is no shred of evidence it has any positive influence at all - meanwhile ignoring the human drama one can cause. It's nothing more then a biased opinion, really; very useful for political slogans and becomming popular with the masses, but nothing else. I dispise this mentality of giving disproportionate sentences 'just to show/scare them'.
Apart from the fact it doesn't, I don't really care for the shock effect; I prefer a state where one is wise enough to sentence someone according to the gravity of his crime. And as much that I hate spam and think those spammer should be brought before court, no sane person can actually claim sending spam is SUCH a huge unforging crime that it deserves 9 years of prison, while phiscally attacking and robbing a person gets much less.
If one would act in proportion, one would give huge fines, and/or moderate jailsentences, depending on recedivism or not. But if you have such absurd disproportionate measures, it's an indication that you have a legal system that is sick and screwed, not healthy and normal. People that think this is all OK, should perhaps convert and live their lives according to the rigid interpretations of the shariat.
--- "To pee or not to pee, that is the question." ---