Eight Charged Over Star Wars Leak

by **Padre** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 9:45 am

Straight from BBC News:

Eight charged over Star Wars leak
Eight people have been charged by US authorities with the illegal online release of the final Star Wars film before it appeared in cinemas.
Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith was leaked onto the internet the day before the film's worldwide release in May.

Documents from the court in Los Angeles allege the copy was taken from a post-production facility in California, where one of the defendants worked.

The defendants are charged with various offences relating to the leak.

Guilty plea

The US attorney in Los Angeles filed a copyright infringement charge against Albert Valente, 28, of Lakewood, California, for taking the Star Wars copy from the post-production house where he worked.

In a statement, the US attorney's office said he had pleaded guilty to the charge.

Six other people were charged with copyright infringement and other charges for copying and distributing the Star Wars film that Valente took.

Another defendant, Marc Hoaglin, 36, of Huntington Beach, California, was charged with putting the film on the internet.

Mr Hoaglin could face up to three years in jail if convicted.

All eight defendants are scheduled to appear in court next month.

by **CodeRed68** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 9:54 am

that is so stupid. why in the world would you jepordize your job and life for something as dumb as this?
then again, people are very stupid.

by **Ldsmith104** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 9:58 am

we should start a legal defence fund for them :lol:

by **gowhitesox99** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 12:15 pm

we could sell bracelets... what color should we use? Black for the death star?

by **girl** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 3:19 pm

No way, those plastic bracelets are so cliche.

by **Padre** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 3:38 pm

For the Death Star it'd have to be grey!

On a related matter for those bracelets... A few weeks ago three people were arrested and charged with fraud for selling fake "Live Strong" Armstrong bracelets. They had to donate all the money to the charity and serve some jail time. I'd tell you more but that's all I can remember.

by **rseven** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 5:09 pm

dam three years in jail just for upping a movie..i thats alittle much..then again these guys had to know each other..one steals the film an the other uploads it for him..an it was problely not the first time they done this. it was funny when cnn showed the server the people were downloading on..lol my friend was downloading from that server..he freaked an disconnected from it

by **King** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 5:21 pm

i saw a copy of that a week or so after it came out, the quality was shit. If people want to risk getting in trouble for a low quality verision of a flick then they get was coming to 'em.

by **CodeRed68** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 5:59 pm

it's like those people who will pay 10 bucks for a dvd of a movie ripped off my some dude who brings a video camera into the movie theatre. noisy, people eating popcorn, walking in front. STUPID!!
What does a brand new official dvd cost? like 15-20 bucks?
puuleeease!

by **King** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 6:02 pm

those are the same people who can't hold their wad in bed. I know some SW dork who bought ever single release of VHS.. including the last one where they previewed Phantom Menace on it. Whats the point? i swear they are living in a fantasy world where they pretend they are luke dryhumper.

by **=ender=** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 6:09 pm

Uhh... yeah. Great. So the guy could face up to three years in jail for this. I wonder how many man hours and money went into the investigation and now subsequent court time and time for the guy to spend in jail? I honestly think there are more important crimes that go unpunished that just as much time, effort, and money should go into as I am sure this one had the luxury of having. Yeah, like Lucas and 20th Century Fox lost any money by this guy putting it out there. This is complete BS, if you ask me. The fine peoples of this nation deserve (and should rightly demand) that such manpower be spent on other, more important matters. Not babying a member of the elite who is crying over his intellectual rights of ownership over something that was crap compared to the original trilogy anyways. Bullshit, if you ask me because it was a waste of time and your tax dollars.

I'm not saying what those idiots did was right. But the time wasted on finding, apprehending, judging, and now punishing them is a worse "crime."

by **CodeRed68** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 7:03 pm

Originally posted by =ender=
I'm not saying what those idiots did was right. But the time wasted on finding, apprehending, judging, and now punishing them is a worse "crime."

yes.. you can say this about 99% of convictions. Look at all the money tax payers dish out to keep child molesters and murders alive in jail. But the law is the law. Somebody has to be held responsible for thier actions. If you let this go lightly, it will just send a message to others that it is ok. Hey, i am not saying they are murderers or anything and sure, there are worse crimes out there. But what they did was stealing. In another country they would have had thier arms cut off.
They should feel lucky they got off so easy.

by **=ender=** » Wed Sep 28, 2005 9:46 pm

Yeah, I know CodeRed. You're right. Still irks me though.

Eight Charged Over Star Wars Leak

Eight Charged Over Star Wars Leak

Who is online