Remember back when X-Men Origins: Wolverine was leaked to the public in the form of the unfinished workprint? Well the FBI got involved in the leak and was dilligently seeking out the origin point of the leak. Then like OJ searching for the real killer, things just got quiet.
Well we just heard that the FBI has made its first official arrest in the case.
According to CNET, 47-year-old Gilberto Sanchez was arrested in the Bronx, N.Y., by FBI agents early yesterday morning under suspicion of uploading the unfinished film to a large file-sharing site. The arrest was later confirmed by a spokesperson for the law enforcement agency’s Los Angeles field office, which is heading the investigation.
“We’re supportive of the FBI’s actions,” a Fox spokeswoman told CNET. “We will continue to cooperate with law enforcement officials to identify and prosecute those who illegally steal our creative content.”
Now to recap, this is not your typical piracy case where some pimple factory who can’t afford to blow his allowance on movie and downloads some pirated content. This was a hard copy of the film near its final stages with effects shots and transitions missing. Someone had to have gone out of their way to copy this and sneak it out to get this public. This constitutes ACTUAL theft, not just the act of piracy and copyright violation.
So while Sanchez was arrested for uploading the copy online, they haven’t arrested him for the original theft of the copy of the workprint. I imagine there is still a bigger investigation going on that will one day reveal who snuck out a copy, and how it ended up online.
Sanchez could get 3 years in jail if he is convicted of the crime, and with that also comes a hefty fine of $250,000, or twice what they determine to be the gross profit loss from the leak. I am not sure how they will determine that number – as the film did far better financially than the reviews and fan reaction would give it credit for.
Any “profit loss” could easily be attributed to the weaker parts of the film just as easily to the scads of people who chose not to go to the theater or buy a copy.
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