Former Leader of Film Piracy Group Sentenced To Five Years In Prison 183
colinneagle writes "The acknowledged leader of once prolific movie piracy group IMAGiNE was sent to prison this week for five years, one of the longest sentences ever handed down for criminal copyright infringement. In addition to his prison term, Jeramiah Perkins, 40, of Portsmouth, Va., was sentenced to serve three years of supervised release and ordered to pay $15,000 in restitution. On Aug. 29, 2012, Perkins pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement. According to the Department of Justice, Perkins was indicted along with three other defendants on April 18, 2012, for their roles in the IMAGiNE Group, an organized online piracy ring that sought to become the premier group to first release Internet copies of movies only showing in theaters. According to court documents, Perkins directed and participated in using receivers and recording devices in movie theaters to secretly capture the audio sound tracks of copyrighted movies. They then synchronized the audio files with illegally recorded video files to create completed movie files suitable for sharing over the Internet via BitTorrent file sharing technology."
gotta keep the prison system full (Score:3, Insightful)
The guy didn't harm anyone and we're locking him up in a cage for 5 years. Well I guess it serves him right for living in this stupid country. Being born here was the dumbest thing I've ever done and remaining here when I could leave is even dumber.
Outrageous (Score:4, Insightful)
Just another sign of how completely out of control the copyright system has become.
Re:U$A (Score:3, Insightful)
Being poor in the US is also quite unpleasant...
Compared to what?
People like you have no damn clue what being poor means. Subsistence farming. Look it up.
Re:now we can be safe (Score:5, Insightful)
At least here, they're going after someone who was systematically and deliberately distributing copyrighted content, rather than just some poor kid running bittorrent.
Re:Outrageous (Score:5, Insightful)
He made more than $400,000 in profits from his illegal wiretapping. I think part of the defendant's actions do cross the line between intellectual property theft and criminal theft, especially because he set up PayPal accounts to accept payment for IMAGINE's releases.
Why should he feel free to profit off the expenses paid by the movie theater for retail space, electricity, equipment, and movie fees? At a certain point, even if the theater still has the item that is claimed to have been stolen, the defendant is stealing his for-profit content from the movie theater.
That's right. (Score:4, Insightful)
In many parts of the World, a US prison would be living like a prince: 3 meals, shelter, clothing, TV and other recreation.
Which makes it quite sad, actually. To think that a US prison is better living than what over a billion people in this World have.
Re:What utter crap ... (Score:1, Insightful)
As long as they don't start locking up Ohio State football players just because they like to rape young women.
Re:That's right. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:U$A (Score:5, Insightful)
being poor in the US is also quite unpleasant
"Daddy bought me the wrong BMW. Life is Pain!"
âoeI have to get dressed so that I donâ(TM)t look too lazy when I go out to pay the gardener. Woe is me!â
"There's nothing to drink at home except an unlimited supply of clean water from the tap. Pity me!"
I grew up poor in the US. I didn't know a single person who starved to death. I didn't know a single person who was "disappeared" by the government. I didn't know a single person who died from parasites, or lost a limb in the factory they worked in as a child.
Your "White Whine" is appalling.
Re:U$A (Score:5, Insightful)
You have got to be trolling at this point. Using homeless people to represent what life is like for most people in the US. Get a clue.
Not only that, he cited panhandling, an activity that when conducted in the western world nets more in a week than many in the 3rd and 2nd world earn in an entire year.
These people really have no clue what its like outside the western world.
India, population 1.2 billion.
32.7% of Indians live on less than $1.25 per day.
68.7% of Indians live on less than $2.00 per day.
Thats more than 2.6 times the entire population of the United States, in one single country, that lives on less than $2 per day.
Poor is relative. On a global scale, nobody at all in the United States is poor.
Re:No sympathy here (Score:2, Insightful)
Yes, and blacks in the US in the 1800s knew it was illegal to be black *and* free. They deserved the penalties they got when they tried to vote. Jim Crow FTW!
Re:U$A (Score:5, Insightful)
Poor is relative. On a global scale, nobody at all in the United States is poor.
It's not clear what point you're trying to make, because you seem to be contradicting yourself. Poverty is always relative. If you want to compare levels of poverty you cannot take into account values like "32.7% of Indians live on less then $1.25 per day" but need to consider the goods people can actually buy for the given amount of money in their country.
People who are about to starve to death in the US might fare well with the same amount of money in some rural part of India and, vice versa, an amount of money that might allow you to survive without problems in some part of the world would not allow you to survive at all in the US without the help of some charity. Such comparisons are completely pointless, because people have to survive where they are living, of course.
Re:U$A (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not clear what point you're trying to make, because you seem to be contradicting yourself. Poverty is always relative. If you want to compare levels of poverty you cannot take into account values like "32.7% of Indians live on less then $1.25 per day" but need to consider the goods people can actually buy for the given amount of money in their country.
That $1.25 is adjusted for purchasing power.
In other words, other people arent the idiots you think that they are just because what they are telling you doesnt jive with the shit that you yourself cannot back up with facts. Its your view of the world that is wrong.
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)