Plea deal in 'war spamming' prosecution
A Los Angeles man accused of using other people's wi-fi networks to send thousands of unsolicited adult-themed e-mails has entered into a plea agreement with prosecutors in a case filed under the criminal provisions of the federal CAN SPAM Act, officials confirmed Friday.
Nicholas Tombros, 37, was scheduled to enter a guilty plea Friday afternoon in federal court in Los Angeles, but the hearing was abandoned when judge Percy Anderson learned the defense attorney who'd signed off on the deal had been hospitalized and could not appear in court. "[Tombros] said that he wanted to take some time, so the judge scheduled us for a status conference in two weeks," says assistant U.S. attorney Wesley Hsu, who's prosecuting the case.
Tombros' phone number is unlisted, and his new attorney did not return a phone call Friday.
Tombros was charged last month with a single felony under the criminal provisions of the CAN SPAM Act. He allegedly drove around the Los Angeles beachfront suburb of Venice with a laptop and a wi-fi antenna sniffing out unsecured residential access points, which he then used to send thousands of untraceable spam messages advertising pornography sites. An FBI spokesperson said Tombros obtained the e-mail addresses from a credit card aggregation company where he used to work.
