US Government's Pirate Movie Bootlegger Gets 24 Months Probation 83
Solandri writes: Ricardo Taylor, a former supervisor at the U.S. Department of Labor, ran a bootleg DVD operation for seven years, copying DVDs and selling them to other employees via the Department's internal email system. You know — exactly the sort of thing our draconian copyright fines were meant to prevent. He made more than $19,000 from these pirated movie sales in 2013 alone. His punishment? 24 months probation. Apparently, using the Internet to share Copyrighted materials at no personal profit is a more serious crime than selling copyrighted works for profit on physical media. More details on this local NBC site with auto-playing video.
It is not what you did .... (Score:5, Interesting)
it is who you know, who you work for. If laws exist the have got to be applied consistently. I wonder if the RIAA will appeal for a tougher sentence ?
It would be interesting to see those apprehended in the future for piracy use this as part of a plea for clemency.
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And they are. Or can you honestly say this judgment surprised you?
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If laws exist the have got to be applied consistently.
And they are. Or can you honestly say this judgment surprised you?
I certainly am surprised at this judgment. The last person to be convicted of this same crime got 4 years in prison, not probation!
Immediately after there were talks to raise even that to 10 years in prison. No where was mentioned changing from prison time to probation nor lowering the number of years, so this is even more of a shock.
Re:It is not what you did .... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:It is not what you did .... (Score:4, Insightful)
What accounts for the difference in punishments is that criminal procedure requires a much higher standard of evidence than the junky stuff allowed under civil procedure, and subject to an overall "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard, rather than "preponderance of evidence." Then to arrive at a judgment requires a unanimous jury, not just a majority.
Civil procedure is specially designed to make lawyers rich and extort large amounts of money out of people by intimidation.
Re:It is not what you did .... (Score:4, Informative)
What accounts for the difference in punishments is that criminal procedure requires a much higher standard of evidence than the junky stuff allowed under civil procedure, and subject to an overall "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard, rather than "preponderance of evidence." Then to arrive at a judgment requires a unanimous jury, not just a majority.
And they had all that and this guy was convicted, so the punishments are equal, right? No. What accounts for the difference is that this guy faced jail time and is now a convicted felon, while Thomas-Rasset did not and is not. And, as others noted, this guy could still be sued and face the same penalties as Thomas-Rasset did.
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Yes, the employee could still be taken to civil court and be cleaned out of his entire assets for the rest of his life, like Thomas-Rasset. This only strengthens my argument.
Re:It is not what you did .... (Score:4, Interesting)
If laws exist the have got to be applied consistently
This guy pleaded guilty, admitted that what he did was wrong, and faced the consequences. It was apparently his first offense so the punishment was essentially a slap on the wrist and warning to not do it again.
Compare that to someone who ignores repeated requests to stop distributing, claims there was nothing wrong with what he did, shows no remorse, etc. That person will likely face a much stiffer punishment. Nothing inconsistent about that.
Re:It is not what you did .... (Score:4, Insightful)
" It was apparently his first offense"
He must of committed the offence thousands of times, so clearly, not a '1st offense' but the first time he was caught for the thousands of offences.
Re:It is not what you did .... (Score:4, Informative)
The legal definition of 1st offense is the first time one is caught and prosecuted.
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Then it is still the first offense of the person who ignored requests to stop distributing too.
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"Compare that to someone who ignores repeated requests to stop distributing, claims there was nothing wrong with what he did, shows no remorse, etc. That person will likely face a much stiffer punishment. Nothing inconsistent about that."
Compare THAT to people who get extorted to pay 3000-5000 dollars for downloading an mp3, most likely with it being the first time they've ever been accused of such a thing. Or someone who gets slapped up with a 1-2 million dollar judgement against them for 12-24 songs on th
Re: It is not what you did .... (Score:2)
*Holds up hand...* (Score:5, Insightful)
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Because politicians watch porn just like the rest of us but don't want their names on any lists at the adult movie store.
Re: *Holds up hand...* (Score:1)
And this guy *did* make such a list of clients. Must be some juicy names there.
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... don't want their names on any lists at the adult movie store.
1993 called. They miss you terribly.
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I highly doubt that most politicians have arrived in the technological world of 1993 already.
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And I miss Miss 1993.
Re:*Holds up hand...* (Score:4, Funny)
This is the Department of Labor. You don't think anyone there actually does any useful work do you? Get real.
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This is the Department of Labor. You don't think anyone there actually does any useful work do you? Get real.
I think telling employers how to stop their employees from getting injured and killed on the job is useful.
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The two major activities of the Department of Labor are supporting unions regardless of merit, and attacking businesses regardless of merit. The 3rd and 4th activities are forcing employers to post silly notices and generating paperwork.
There's a story about a woman who sued her husband for divorce, on grounds of impotence.
They had a trial before a jury.
The man testified that not only was he not impotent, but he described his extravagant sexual prowess in detail.
The jury didn't believe him, and gave his wife a divorce.
They said he obviously knew nothing about the subject at all.
You remind me of that story, because you obviously know nothing about the subject at all.
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To burn 5 DVDs at once, of course.
Why is it that people demand so little insight into private business - especially when it's contracting to government - but government departments, which receive some of the most oversight of any organisation (NSA/CIA excepted), receive the ire of each citizen over every last cent spent, no matter how reaonable?
I know, I know, "Government money is my money!" Except it's not - it's government money. The reason you have property is that the government protects it for you. The
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Government spending is highly scrutinized because 1) the taxes to pay for it takes money away from citizens and business who could spend the money in other places and 2) the federal government has incurred over 18 trillion dollars in debt. If the debt reaches a point where lenders to the US become concerned about the ability of the US to repay their money, those interest rates will rise. Not only does this make it more expensive to for the government to borrow and repay debt, but other interest rates are p
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Capitalism as ideology-in-practice is as fantastical as communism, with competition as philosophy being as religious an approach as one of complete harmonious cooperation, but mix them together and you have an advanced modern society.
That's because some of the leading theorists of modern American capitalism are ex-Communists who left the party, denounced their old friends to HUAC, found rich patrons, and used their old skills and doublethink to glorify the free market. The National Review was full of them.
If in your youth you could justify the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovokia, then your country needed your skills then to justify the U.S. invasion of Vietnam, Iran, etc. If you could defend Stalin, then you could easily turn your skills
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As for the auditing of private business, I disagree that it should be permitted. The issue you're describing occurs as a result of a lack of competition, either through a monopoly that has arisen from acquisitions or competitors failing or a government-granted monopoly such as a utility. Competition is extremely effective at reducing prices for consumers, improving the quality of service, and eliminating waste by businesses. Deregulation of utilities is a better solution than audits. However, anti-trust laws must be strongly enforced to ensure a persistent state of competition, or else the market will move toward a monopoly that may not be in the interest of consumers.
Every private business that is large enough to have stockholders is audited. Otherwise, how do you know that the CEO of the business isn't pocketing cash, or putting his daughter in a do-nothing job? How do you know the bookkeeper isn't stealing?
Competition isn't as efficient as you think it is. The coal mining industry is or was a competitive industry. But a lot of coal mines regularly had accidents, workers regularly died, and the managers and owners didn't do anything about it.
The Wall Street Journal use
Re: *Holds up hand...* (Score:2)
(especially since Ronald Reagan) the budget for workplace inspections, and the number of inspectors, has been cut throughout MSHA
In 1980, the year Reagan was elected, the United Mine Workers represented 160,000 miners. In 2005, that number was 16,000. Since there are 10 times fewer coal miners than when Reagan was elected, doesn't it stand to reason that they need fewer safety inspectors?
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(especially since Ronald Reagan) the budget for workplace inspections, and the number of inspectors, has been cut throughout MSHA
In 1980, the year Reagan was elected, the United Mine Workers represented 160,000 miners. In 2005, that number was 16,000. Since there are 10 times fewer coal miners than when Reagan was elected, doesn't it stand to reason that they need fewer safety inspectors?
All industrial jobs have declined since 1980. I mentioned coal mining because that's an occupation in which, to quote a Wall Street Journal headline, mines can be safe if the employers really try. In other words, in the free market, especially with high unemployment, many mine owners will skip standard, recommended safety procedures in order to make more profits, and have fatal accidents as a result. There are a few mine owners that follow safety procedures rigorously, but they're going against their free m
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After I read the studies, I called up the engineer who had done them. He was really enthusiastic about saving lives, and we had a nice conversation. He said that they had done ten studies and stopped. I asked him why they stopped and he said, "Ronald Reagan." As governor of California, Reagan cut the budget for the safety studies.
Wait, hang on. As you tell the story, "the California OSHA" did 10 studies, which all concluded that tools should come with built in GFCIs. Then, the government mandated built in GFCIs in power tools. Then, you talked to some nameless engineer who blamed Ronald Reagan for cutting off the studies..
Did it occur to you that the government found solution to the problem, mandated that solution, and then decided to devote its resources elsewhere? Should they have done more studies to justify mandatory GFCIs AFT
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After I read the studies, I called up the engineer who had done them. He was really enthusiastic about saving lives, and we had a nice conversation. He said that they had done ten studies and stopped. I asked him why they stopped and he said, "Ronald Reagan." As governor of California, Reagan cut the budget for the safety studies.
Wait, hang on. As you tell the story, "the California OSHA" did 10 studies, which all concluded that tools should come with built in GFCIs. Then, the government mandated built in GFCIs in power tools. Then, you talked to some nameless engineer who blamed Ronald Reagan for cutting off the studies..
No, there were 10 studies.
These engineers were investigating accidents and writing reports. They looked over all the reports to identify the most common categories of workplace fatalities, and then did individual studies of each of those categories to see why they were happening and whether there was any way to prevent them. They wrote a total of 10 reports. 2 of them were about electrocutions. One was about electrocutions in boom trucks, and the other was about electrocutions involving GFCIs. After they pu
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None of this has anything to do with what I originally asserted, which is that we don't need as many mine safety inspectors as in 1980 because there are 90% fewer miners. This applies more broadly to all industrial jobs and OSHA inspectors, although that ratio isn't as stark a contrast as with the miners.
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The healthcare system: A. Under Obama, deliberately messed up to encourage people to agitate for an even worse system, B. Before Obama, the tax code encouraged a system (untaxed employer-
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They now have pretty much all their publications on line.
http://www.bls.gov/opub/ [bls.gov]
Don't forget, Gordon Crovitz notwithstanding, the government really did invent the Internet. http://articles.latimes.com/20... [latimes.com]
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So why, exactly, does the DoL have 5-tray DVD burners in the first place?
The DoL publishes a shitload of documents. They used to publish it all on paper. Now they publish it on the Internet, but at one time they could presumably save a lot of money if they published it on DVDs. If you want a report of every workplace fatality in the US in 2005, that's a lot of paper that you could fit on 1 DVD.
http://www.bls.gov/opub/ [bls.gov]
http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/public... [dol.gov]
https://www.osha.gov/ [osha.gov]
(But that's assuming the DoL did have 5-tray DVD burners. The article just says that the guy used 5-tray DVD b
Re: *Holds up hand...* (Score:2)
Socialism vs Capitalism! (Score:5, Funny)
It's because he was selling the movies for profit, of course... the studios can respect some good honest capitalist theft, I mean c'mon, most of the studios have at least a couple of outright thefts of their own.
No no, the REAL threats to the system are those damn pinko socialist commies just GIVING AWAY the studio's "property". We can't let that stand, no sir!
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It's just so un-american to want nothing for giving out nothing! That alone has to be punished.
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That's what The Fantastic Summary alluded to. "Apparently, using the Internet to share Copyrighted materials at no personal profit is a more serious crime than selling copyrighted works for profit on physical media."
What is /. coming to? First Beta, then in-feed polls, now the summary's content gets forced on us even when we do not want to read the articles or summaries, but only the content????
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Pirate movie bootlegger (Score:1)
Maybe he got off lightly as he was only bootlegging pirate movies?
Criminal versus Civil (Score:4, Informative)
While I agree he should have probably gotten a more severe penalty, comparing the civil cases versus a criminal case is an unfair comparison. The companies could still pursue a civil case against him and they have an automatic win on their hands because of the criminal conviction. He could end up with what he was sentenced to here PLUS a civil case for a huge amount. This isn't necessarily the end of it, it's just the end of what the government can do.
Also, I can't find anywhere exactly what he was convicted of, but I would guess this was felony level copyright violation, which means he now has a felony on his record which in reality is a much bigger deal than losing a civil case and owing the companies a ridiculous amount of money because it means you basically can't get a decent job anymore.
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... it means you basically can't get a decent job anymore.
Well, I guess if you work at the DoL you are already past the stage where "a decent job" is very high on your priorities list.
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The United States does not seek an award of restitution as part of the sentence, due to difficulty determining the amount of actual loss suffered by any victims as a result of the conduct. In a similar circumstance, the D.C. Court of Appeals recently found that a district court abused its discretion in awarding restitution in a copyright infringement case where the evidence was unclear on whether the defendant’s conduct “in fact thwarted actual sales of the victim’s product.” United States v. Fair, 699 F.3d 508, 514 (D.C. Cir. 2012). The Court of Appeals noted that “a defendant’s gain is not an appropriate measure of the victim’s actual loss in [Mandatory Victims Restitution Act] calculations.” Id. at 513. Counsel for the United States reached out to the Motion Picture Association of America, a trade group representing the major American motion picture studios, to inform the group of the August 13 sentencing date and that there may be a right to present a Victim Impact Statement if desired.
There would be no such limitations in a civil suit against him.
Does he get to keep the money? (Score:2)
In this economy, I am pretty sure for 19k a lot of people would accept a 2 year probation time.
Do I have to do the crime to get the money?
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Yes, you have to commit the crime to get the money. The 19k was from profits from running a bootleg dvd service. Our government is not paying people to take probation periods.
Do I need to quote you your own signature?
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Lois Lerner is one of the more recent and egregious counterexamples.
Of course filesharers are punished more harshly. (Score:1)
You see, if you share the files for free, it calls into question the concept that intellectual property has value in the first place. By comparison, sure, this guy made money, but at least he didn't upend the paradigm.
What about all the buyers? (Score:3)
Draconian ???? (Score:2)
30 Years In The Mail Room (Score:5, Interesting)
You are 57 years old ---
at an age when most of us are worried about retaining our jobs, retirement benefits and health insurance.
You managed a federal government mail room and a movie theater and are now for all practical purposes unemployable in the only jobs you have ever known.
Out of habit, you retained a full set of account books and ledgers documenting every pirate transaction,
Your guilty plea on the federal criminal charge soon to be followed by a settlement with the rights agencies for the damages they can now claim and win in the federal civil courts.
Its communism! (Score:2)