Woman jailed over friend’s email account

3 March 2004

BARCELONA – A woman was jailed for two years Wednesday and ordered to pay a fine of EUR 26,886 for using a former friend’s email account and sending distressing messages.

In the first case of its kind in Spain, the 28-year-old was sent to prison by a judge in Barcelona who wanted to make an example of her.

The woman got access to the password of her former friend, Bufet Almeida, in November 2001.

The two women studied together, and she remembered certain crucial dates in Almeida’s life and guessed her hotmail password.

She sent messages from her former friend’s email address, some of them compromising.

She also revealed some of Almeida’s secrets.

In one message, she criticised Almeida’s boss just as her former friend was about to take professional examinations.

Almeida became suspicious, and after an elaborate system of sending emails tracked down the guilty party.

A medical report said Almeida had suffered post-traumatic stress disorder between November 2001 – when the bogus emails started  – and March the next year, when they stopped.

The victim had asked that the woman was sent to jail for seven years.

But her defence lawyer said she should only pay a fine.

The judge said the woman should be sent to jail and pay the fine for psychological damage which she had caused to Almeida.

[Copyright EFE with Expatica]

Subject: Spanish news