Judge Imposes Nine-Year Term for Convicted Spammer

LEESBURG, Va. (AP) - A Virginia judge sentenced a spammer to nine years in prison Friday in the nation's first felony prosecution for sending junk e-mail, though the sentence was postponed while the case is appealed.

Loudoun County Circuit Judge Thomas Horne said that because the law targeting bulk e-mail distribution is new and raises constitutional questions, it was appropriate to defer the prison time until appeals courts rule.

A jury had recommended the nine-year prison term after convicting Jeremy Jaynes of pumping out at least 10 million e-mails a day with the help of 16 high-speed lines, the kind of Internet capacity a 1,000-employee company would need.

Jaynes, of Raleigh, N.C., told the judge that regardless of how the appeal turns out, "I can guarantee the court I will not be involved in the e-mail marketing business again."

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Is it just me, or does 9 years sound a tad harsh for spamming?

Molester minister gets six months

March 30,2005
Brittney Booth
The Monitor


EDINBURG — Former Trinity Worship Center minister Robert Dale Franklin will spend six months in jail and a decade on probation after pleading guilty to sexually assaulting a 14-year-old boy who he had agreed to spiritually mentor.

State District Judge Mario Ramirez on Tuesday sentenced Franklin, 38, after hearing testimony from the boy’s family, Franklin’s supporters and Franklin himself.

"There is no excuse for any of your actions," the judge told Franklin who pleaded guilty last week to two felony counts of sexual assault and admitted to a drug problem.

Franklin’s guilty plea halted a jury trial and allowed him to avoid 10 other felony counts a grand jury indicted him with, including charges he gave marijuana and cocaine to the boy.

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:sarcasm:

Don

MOORHEAD, Minn. - The family of a man killed with a hatchet says a one-year sentence isn't enough for a man who witnessed the slaying and then helped clean up the crime scene.

Lee Solarski, 22, of Moorhead, reached a plea agreement in the December killing of David Hinojosa Jr. of Dilworth. Hinojosa was killed on a gravel road north of Glyndon; authorities said it was over a drug debt of $50 to $60.

"Even though Lee didn't kill my brother, he didn't try to help him," Jennifer Hinojosa, 14, wrote in a victim impact statement. "In my eyes you are a murderer as well as the other two."

Clay County Attorney Lisa Borgen defended the agreement, noting that Solarski will testify in first-degree murder trials for James Allen Gunderson, 22, of West Fargo, N.D., and John Jacob Cooper, 26, of Fargo, N.D.