Spammer could be Sentenced to Prison Following a Facebook Lawsuit

A U.S. federal judge has referred a legal suit by Facebook against alleged spammer Sanford Wallace to the Office of U.S Attorney General for probable criminal dealings.

To elaborate, Jeremy Fogel Judge of U.S District Court handling cases for California's Northern District forwarded the case of Sanford Wallace known as a "spam king" because of his aggressive and long involvement in e-mail scams to the Office of U.S Attorney General to bring Wallace to justice for his alleged infringement of an injunction, which barred him from using Facebook. PCWorld reported this on June 13, 2009.

In February 2009, Facebook had filed a legal suit charging Wallace and his two accomplices that they operated phishing and spam campaigns via the social-networking website. During the week that followed, Judge Fogel ordered Wallace and co-partners, Scott Shaw and Adam Arzoomanian to temporarily restrain from operating on Facebook's network.

In a statement via e-mail, Facebook said that the company was very happy that Judge Fogel acknowledged that there existed basis regarding Wallace's involvement in crime and that it was important for the Office of U.S Attorney General to investigate the spam king.

Also, according to Facebook, the order ought to work as a firm restraint against other spammers. The company indicated that the ruling by Fogel shows that judges would implement deterring orders while spam mailers who infringe on them would be prosecuted.

However, there is currently a halt in the judicial proceedings of the case as defendant Wallace has declared that he is bankrupt. The social site further said that it was nothing surprising that Wallace called himself bankrupt and although it deferred their judgment temporarily, Facebook would pursue the case and review Wallace's declaration closely.

Meanwhile, Wallace has been spamming since 1990. In 2008, court ordered Wallace and a co-culprit to pay MySpace.com $234m when Wallace failed to present documents and also to appear in court after a certain trail.

Furthermore, in 2008, the San Jose federal court awarded Facebook $873m in the biggest-ever judgment pertaining to a case under the Can-Spam Act as compensation against a Canadian spammer who attacked the site's users.

» SPAMfighter News - 27-06-2009

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