"Buffalo Spammer" Gets 3.5 to 7 Years

jfruhlinger writes "Howard Carmak, aka the 'Buffalo spammer,' has been sentenced to jail time for his spamming activities. Interestingly, the conviction was not for spamming per se, but rather stealing someone's identity, which he then used to launch his spam messages."

Hurrah for Erie County!

[YankeeInExile]

The jail sentence is the maximum allowed under the law, due to Carmack's prior felony conviction for fraud in a federal case involving fake money orders, McCarthy said.

And from another article ...

Carmack is accused of stealing credit cards and identities to fraudulently buy 343 EarthLink accounts to send shady and unwanted e-mail for such things as herbal therapy. Prosecutors said they do not yet know how he acquired the credit card information. He is also accused of banking fraud and other illegal activities arising from his spam operation, which authorities believe he operated on his own.

But your honor, I was trying to run an HONEST business of stealing peopele's time and identitiy! Now I'll have to go back to mail fraud!

I hope he enjoys his term in state pound-me-up-the-ass prison. This is the only thing that will curtail the (domestic) spam problem. Harsh, painful prison sentences.

Earthlink

[squidfrog]

Here's [clickz.com] the original Earthlink case.

How he got caught.

[Valejo]

How he got caught. [internetnews.com]

Spam and fake money orders

[Lord Zerrr]

Seems he also had prior felony for fake money orders.

"The jail sentence is the maximum allowed under the law, due to Carmack's prior felony conviction for fraud in a federal case involving fake money orders, McCarthy said."

Re:Good...

[dr_dank]

Very similar to Al Capone. For all of his rumrunning, racketeering, murder and other activities, he was only successfully prosecuted for tax evasion.

Pound-me-in-the-ass prison is Cruel and Unusual

[zifferent]

You shouldn't be applauding prison rape. I don't care what a person did, they don't deserve to be ass raped till they bleed, or become Bubba's for protection.

In particular spam is annoying but does getting ass raped really fit the crime? Put yourself in their shoes, your a small geeky guy faced with 5 to 7 and your choice is hook up with someone and get it up the ass by one person, or not and the whole prison will gang-rape you. Phsycologically, you've lost all control in your life and you begin to despair and lose hope. If you're lucky your suicide attempt succeeds, because if the prison guards suspect that you attempted suicide to get away from the general population, they will throw you back to wolves, where you can die a slow painfull, tortured death from the nightly ass-poundings you receive.

That's not even funny.

It's a serious issue.

To learn more:
http://www.spr.org [spr.org]

Re:Victimless Crime?

[geoffspear]

It's a crime because the government defines it as a crime. Examples include drug possession and sodomy.

Re:Aggregate costs

[Elminst]

how many aggregate "irreplaceable years of life" this scumbag cost others

According to my spiffy SpamNet [cloudmark.com] statistics window; the collective community (~970K) would have lost a combined 8200 days (since the program began) dealing with spam ourselves.

Dropping the soap...

[Thjorska]

And while people get upset over the horrifying abuse of prisoners in another country, others are more than happy to make fun of the horrifying abuses suffered by prisoners in their own country.

Worse than that, you don't get writedowns...

[leonbrooks]

...for tools-of-trade, fuel bought for the getaway car, things like that.