Should 'spam king' Soloway pay the price for worse?

Notorious spam king Robert Alan Soloway is scheduled to be sentenced Monday by the US District Court in Seattle after pleading guilty to single counts of mail fraud, e-mail fraud, and tax evasion. Judge Marsha Pechman, who is presiding over the case, has scheduled a two-day hearing starting Friday to allow prosecution and defense to get their final arguments before the court.

The first two charges carry maximum sentences of 20 years and five years respectively, while the tax evasion charge carries a maximum penalty of one year. Soloway also faces fines of up to US$250,000 on the first two counts and an additional $25,000 for tax evasion.

Soloway was originally indicted last year on a 40-count charge that included mail and wire fraud, money laundering, and aggravated identity theft. The indictment alleged that between October 1997 and May 2007, Soloway ran a company called Newport Internet Marketing (NIM), selling e-mail spamming services and a software product that let others send spam of their own.

According to court documents, the company was originally set up to sell that software. In 2002, Soloway expanded his business to include tiered spamming services of his own.

According to court papers, Soloway customers purchasing the $195 "bronze" level of service were told that their messages would be sent out to 2 million e-mail address in 15 days, while those buying "platinum"-level service for $495 were promised their message would get delivered to 20 million e-mail addresses in the same time frame. In addition, Soloway claimed that his company had created a database containing over 157 million permission-based, opt-in e-mail addresses which customers could use to target spam by geography or audience interest.

The original indictment charged Soloway with using legitimate e-mail address and domain names so as to make it appear that the spam was originating from someone else. Victims whose domain names and e-mails were thus forged often ended up in spam blacklists, and had their own servers and e-mail inboxes flooded with bounced spam messages.

Often the spamming services and the products which Soloway advertised and sold via the dozens of sites he operated did not deliver as promised, and customers who sought to get refunds where in turn threatened with collection activities.

In a pre-sentencing memorandum, prosecutors noted that Soloway was known worldwide for the volume and "markedly malicious nature of his criminal spamming activity," and his fraudulent promotion of spam. The memorandum, which recommends a nine-year prison sentence for Soloway, pointed to his "brazen and even boastful claims that he is above the law and anyone -- including federal judges -- who would dare attempt to seek his compliance with it." They noted that Soloway pleaded guilty to the three single counts 10 days before he was to go on trail.

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