MediaPost reports that the tough Maryland anti-spam law suffered a setback when a state judge struck it down in its current form in the proceedings of a civil suit brought against a New York-based company. The judge said that the connection between the sender, receiver and Maryland was too tenuous to find the sender liable. The fact pattern of the case was a particularly weak one it seems, with the emails in question containing valid unsubscribe links, although allegedly misleading subject lines - something the defense was quick to deny. The mails were sent from New York, through Virginia, to Washington D.C., although to a person who was technically a Maryland resident. Maryland's anti-spam law has or had some of the sharpest teeth of all the spam laws in the country, allowing for significant jail time for spammers found guilty of criminal charges.