MS pirate gets two years jail and $500K fine

Paul Stamatis, a trafficker in counterfeit Microsoft software over the Internet, was sentenced Thursday to two years in jail, and was ordered to pay $500,000 in restitution to Microsoft.

Stamatis was arrested in February last year, along with two other Californian men, Robert Gaboury and Chia Yu Ku, Reuters reports.

Ku had been involved in obtaining copies of the software, packaging it and then passing it along to Stamatis, and others, who in turn distributed to various resellers, such as Gaboury, around the US. Gaboury was also involved in distributing the bootleg software to more resellers.

Gaboury pleaded guilty to conspiring to violate copyright and trademark laws last year, for which he received six months in prison and six months of home confinement.

Stamatis and Ku both pleaded guilty to trafficking and criminal trademark violations and while Stamatis has just been given the sentence, Ku is still waiting for his turn. ®

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