Judge Rejects Guilty Plea From AOL Employee

The Hobo writes "Newsday has a story on a New York judge who rejected Jason Smather's guilty plea. Smathers, covered previously on Slashdot, was the AOL employee who stole and sold AOL addresses to spammers. The judge himself apparently cancelled his AOL subscription due to receiving too much spam. While he didn't like what Jason did, he wasn't convinced a crime had been committed under the CAN-SPAM law, which requires that a person be deceived."

Comments

Re:Does not compute

[The Only Druid]

It doesn't matter if its deceptive or fradulent, because the charge was specifically done under a particular law: the can-spam act, which has specific requirements. The judge determined that the charge failed to allege an actual violation of that law.

Essentially, the judge instituted a 12(b)(6) motion, dismissing the suit for failure to state a claim upon which action could be based.

Re:Theft / Invasion of Privacy

[The Only Druid]

Apparently, the prosecutors didn't believe they could prove those crimes, since the claim doesn't include charges of those crimes. The judge isn't allowed to create charges: the judge can only determine the validity of charges made by the prosecutors.