RSSGuilty: Prolific spammer says he didn't file tax returns
By Michael Hatamoto | Published March 18, 2008, 10:11 AM
A man dubbed the "king of spam" pleaded guilty last Friday to federal charges of mail and wire fraud, aggravated identity theft, and tax evasion, not to mention sending millions of pieces of spam over a four-year period.
Seattle resident Robert Soloway, the owner of Newport Internet Marketing Corp. (NIMC) pleaded guilty in the U.S. District Court in Seattle. In 2005, Soloway made $309,725 in revenue, but did not file an income tax return.
"Spam is a scourge of the Internet, and Robert Soloway is one of its most prolific practitioners," US Attorney for the Western District of Washington Jeff Sullivan said in a statement. "Our investigators dubbed him the 'Spam King' because he is responsible for millions of spam e-mails."
After Soloway launched his online business in November 2003, federal investigators first indicted him in May 2007, when he faced a 40-count indictment that included money laundering and identity theft charges. In a plea agreement with the Justice department, prosecutors agreed to drop 37 charges against Soloway, though the remaining charges carried heavy fines and jail time.
The NIMC company sent "broadcast e-mail" software and service spam to businesses and users, oftentimes using clever tricks to avoid detection. Soloway reportedly hopped the NIMC Web site to more than 50 domains. The government alleged he used a stolen credit card number to pay for at least one of those domains. He was especially difficult to track down because he created false headers belonging to legitimate businesses and real users, which sometimes led to accusations of spamming being directed towards innocent parties.
Soloway will be sentenced in late June. He faces up to 26 years in federal prison and fines up to $625,000.
note none of the charges stem from spam; they only got him on fraud (stealing "customer's money") and money laundering (because he didn't pay taxes).
for spammers that file tax returns and don't engage in identity theft, the field still appears to be wide open. 8^O
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See, that's why you have to file state income tax.
The fed no one cares about. I'm not going to pay that ever again.
America Freedom to fascism explains why
http://video.google.com/...cid=5355374476580235299
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The fed no one cares about. I'm not going to pay that ever again.
...let us know how that works out for ya.
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Kind of what I was thinking.
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Anybody interested in buying our new herbal remedy called "AllCure" ? It's good for whatever ails you.
No..??
Okay, how's about a great deal on some Viagra then ?
:-D
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Nah, still waiting on my order of Fukitol.
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I only use v1@6ra 'cause viagra is such a rip
off that it requires a doctor to check my heart.
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If you ask me he got off to lightly.
All the time people spent digging through their emails to get to real and usable emails. Maybe with this other spammers will think twice about sending out their junk.
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He should be forced to use Windows Me for the rest of his life.
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I vote for 3.1
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Lets Hope he does pick up the soap !
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I don't think the sentence is strong enough
he should be stripped of all his assets and the money's returned to the people affected by the scams as well as the ISPs getting a slice in return for them reducing thier charges to their customers as well as being baned from using a computer for life
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Have fun distributing that money, though
If it was mostly revenue from 100's of millions of people, that might be a tough proposition.
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