A US man has been found guilty of sending over 825 million spam emails and faces a mandatory sentence of two to seven years' jail on 14 counts of forgery, identity theft, falsifying business records and criminal possession of a forgery device. Prosecutors claimed he was raking in between $60,000 and $70,000 prior to his arrest in May 2002.

Thirty-seven-year-old Howard H. Carmack - aka the "Buffalo Spammer" - was the first person to be charged under New York's "identity theft statute" after "defrauding Internet service provider EarthLink and eight men from New York State, Ohio and Washington, D.C., by either fraudulently obtaining EarthLink accounts in their names or using their corporate email addresses to sell products".

EarthLink's assistant general counsel Karen Cashion said that the conviction "puts spammers on notice that in addition to being held liable for millions of dollars in civil damages, they can also be sent to prison for their intrusive and illegal emails".

Carmack is due to be sentenced on 27 May. His attorney says he will appeal the conviction. ®

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