In November, a jury in Loudon County Virginia convicted a brother and sister of violating the state’s tough Anti-Spam Statute. This week, according to the Leesburg Today news site, the Judge dismissed the case against the sister, overturning the jury verdict finding a lack of evidence to convict her. The brother, Jeremy Jaynes, is accused of sending 10,000 unsolicited commercial emails in a three day period. The sister, Jessica DeGroot, was alleged to have purchased domain names that were then used in the sending process. Finding that the only proof introduced against here was that she had a name on a credit card, and a lack of proof that the card was used during the period in question to purchase any domain names, the Judge dismissed the charge indicating he felt the jury may have become confused regarding the brother and sister pair.
Jeremy Jaynes attorney says he will appeal the decision. The trial judge, refusing to act on Jaynes’ dismissal motions, has set his sentencing for April 8th, 2005. At that time it is expected that Jaynes will be sentenced to incarceration.
The case is triable in Virginia because many of the targeted recipients had AOL addresses, and AOL has processing operations centered in that jurisdiction. One wonders if others will open processing facilities in Virginia to avail themselves of the tough anti-spam act.
