‘Spam King’ Pleads Guilty to Fraud

Soloway pleaded guilty to those charges as part of a deal to have 37 other counts, including multiple charges of identity theft and money laundering, dropped. He was set to go to trial in two weeks.

Ironically, he is not being sentenced for spamming.

The mail fraud charge carries a sentence of up to 20 years. The e-mail fraud charge carries a sentence of up to five years. The tax charge is punishable by up to a year in prison.

Soloway was arrested last May and accused of defrauding people who paid him to send bulk e-mail on their behalf and people who bought e-mail software from him.

According to prosecutors, Soloway’s company, Newport Internet Marketing, defrauded customers by offering to send bulk e-mail on their behalf or to sell software so they could do it themselves. Both options resulted in millions of spam e-mails and did not generate the sales for customers Soloway advertised, prosecutors alleged. When customers complained, Soloway would threaten to charge them more fees and refer them to collection agencies.

According to spam blacklist maintainer Spamhaus, Soloway is a "long-term spammer and harvested list seller.” Spamhaus also claims that Soloway committed “hundreds of felony violations of U.S. computer crime laws daily.”

Microsoft in 2005 won a judgment against Soloway for allegedly sending e-mails that appeared to have come from MSN and Hotmail addresses.

Also in 2005, Oklahoma businessman and anti-spam activist Robert Braver won a $10 million default judgment against Soloway.

Soloway has been frequently cited as one of the top 10 spammers in the world.