strange apache/mysql problem

Hi,
I run a LAMP webserver and have been having a strangle problem
recently with MySQL and Apache.

We got hit by a spammer a few days ago that managed to fill our root
partition up completely with junk (our partition setup is simple, just
/ and /home). I blocked the spammer, cleaned up the mess, and
restarted apache and mysql because they seemed to have come to a halt
when the partition filled up.

Everything seemed fine until a few hours later I noticed that on a few
(but not all) of some of the sites on the server were having MySQL
errors ("Too many connections", or just simply "Unable to connect"). I
logged in and top reported CPU usage at 97% (this is on a 1.3ghz
system), and that there were more mysqld and httpd processes than I
could count. I restarted them both and everything was fine for a few
more hours until I noticed the same problem. This time I rebooted the
server to be safe.

When I came back home a few hours later, I couldn't get to any of the
sites we hosted at all. I could ping and SSH in but not get anything
through web. I killed and restarted apache and mysql and everything
went back to normal. It's now continuing in this pattern (normal
operation -> "too many connections/unable to connect" errors -> and if
left long enough, simply not responding at all).

Does anyone have any ideas on what could be the problem? I'm stumped
on this one because I'm not seeing anything in the logs that would
point to any problems.

In alt.apache.configuration Brad Wenner <xbradx.DeleteThis@hotmail.com> wrote:
 > We got hit by a spammer a few days ago that managed to fill our root
 > partition up completely with junk

Standard *nix won't allow this, since 10% of the disk space is
reserved to root, if he managed to fill it up, it means he was
root. Reinstall the whole system.

Davide

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