SAN DIEGO
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An Iowa man who sent millions of unsolicited e-mails advertising software to “steal anyone's password” and “read your FBI file” pleaded guilty yesterday to violating an anti-spam law.
Joshua Eveloff, 27, admitted faking the information on the e-mails to hide the true sender.
“He's one of the first spammers ever caught,” prosecutor Anne Perry said.
The prosecution is the first in San Diego and the third nationwide under a 2003 law banning unsolicited e-mails, she said.
Such messages, known as spam, comprise a huge percentage of all e-mails. Companies spend millions of dollars to keep them from reaching their customers and employees.j
“The criminal activities of spammers interfere with the legitimate use of the Internet,” San Diego FBI spokesman Darrell Foxworth said.
The case was investigated here because another man involved in the scheme, Michael Twombly, 43, is from Cardiff.
Twombly pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor Jan. 22. Both are scheduled to be sentenced in April.
Eveloff could face up to three years in prison. He is more likely to get six to 12 months if U.S. District Judge Larry Alan Burns follows the recommendations of lawyers in the case. Twombly faces a lesser sentence because he had a smaller role in the crime.
In January, a Los Angeles federal jury convicted Jeffrey Goodin, 45, of Azusa of sending spam soliciting account information from America Online customers. He stole more than $1 million and faces up to 101 years in prison at a sentencing scheduled for June 11.
The convictions in San Diego are different from Goodin's in that prosecutors didn't accuse Eveloff or Twombly of fraud.
Eveloff had more than 100 million e-mail addresses in his computer when he was arrested at his home in Carter Lake, Iowa, a small city next to Omaha, Neb., Perry said in a court filing.
Onell Soto: (619) 293-1280; onell.soto@uniontrib.com
