A man who spammed millions of AOL subscribers with pornography and get-rich-quick schemes has pleaded guilty to second-degree forgery in a US District court.

District Attorney Jeanine Pirro said the prosecution is believed to be the first of its kind in the country. "This office will not relinquish the vanguard of technology to those whose intent and purpose is to commit old crimes in new ways," she said.

Jason Garon, 46, of Mission Viejo, California admitted that he took over a Westchester company's Internet service to send the unsolicited mails, which he disguised to make appear as though they had come from IBM's Internet provider, IBM.net.

Eventually the emails were traced to his apartment where he was arrested and his computer removed by Orange County investigators.

New York-based graphics studio Market Vision, the company whose machines he used, said the abuse had cost the business around $18,000.

The maximum sentence for the offence is seven years. ®

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