Unknown, dont give him any ideas. He OBVIOUSLY does not want to do this to any good with,
As for this "error" your "friend" is recieveing apon trying to send his new password, if login.php did not exist, noone would go to the forum anymore, therefore voiding any use of recovering any password.

Passwords can be changed not viewed, they can be changed by converting a string to md5 and pasting it in the user table under password (if i remember correctly)

You'd have to incorporate the user's salt into the hash as well. Wouldn't it be easier to change their password in the ACP?

yeah, but i remember having my admin password changed on my old boards (like 3 years ago?)
and i was able to use that method.
they must have changed it :D

So you want to access your old Admin accounts on forums to which you don't Administer anymore?