The "GODFATHER of Spam" made $3M pumping Chinese penny stocks

Alan Ralsky was an insurance salesman who got his license revoked in 1996
So he sold his car, bought 2 computers and started emailing strangers
By 2002 he was sending hundreds of millions of spam emails per day
His scam was simple: buy tiny Chinese stocks for cents, spam millions of people hyping them up and dump his shares once they bought in
In summer 2005 alone he made $3 million doing exactly this
He even built an 8,000 square foot mansion and called it "the house that spam built"
Then he did a proud interview with the Detroit Free Press showing it off and calling spam "the greatest business model in the world"
Someone posted the article on Slashdot
Slashdot users found his home address and signed him up for every catalog and mailing list they could find
His mailbox was buried in physical junk mail for years
That same year the FBI raided his house
3 years later he was charged with 10 partners in Hong Kong, Russia, California and Arizona
He got 51 months federal prison, had to pay back $250,000 and was fined another $250,000
The spam king got buried in spam, then buried in federal court