Another spammer was sentenced to some “quality time” in prison, this time for 30 months, after being found guilty of sending over 250.000 spam messages to more than 1.2 million AOL subscribers in a very short period of time. Adam Vitale, 27, and his partner Todd Moeller, 29, both collaborated in the scheme that got Moeller convicted for 27 months last December.

Adam Vitale and his partner got caught while trying to make a deal with a government informant to send junk e-mails to 1.2 million AOL subscribers and get 50 percent of the profits. The two partners managed to avoid AOL spam filter system by changing header information and relying on open proxies and several servers.

Despite the fact that spammers rarely get convictions for their illicit activities, Vitale follows the steps of his partner and will spend the next 30 months in jail. Vitale, who was sentenced in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in Manhattan, will also have to pay a $180.000 restitution bill to AOL, after violating federal anti-spam laws.

While Moeller pleaded guilty on two counts in December last year, one of e-mail fraud and one of conspiracy to commit e-mail fraud, Vitale seems to have also contributed to an online prostitution ring on the Web, which he hasn’t been criminally charged for.

“Spamming is serious criminal conduct; this is not a teenager engaging in child’s play,” said U.S. District Judge Judge Denny Chin while delivering the sentence.

This year alone, Jeremy Jaynes was convicted to 9 years in prison for illegal spamming activities, and Robert Soloway, the so-called “Spam King,” faces up to 26 years in prison after pleading guilty in March 2008 of felony mail fraud and fraud in connection with e-mail.

It seems like the justice system begins to tighten its tolerance to such activities, and punishments have started to move from simple fines to years in prison.