Judge throws book at software pirate

Texas man given 46 months in federal prison, ordered to pay $1.154 million for latest charges.

Dashiell Ponce de Leon of Richmond, Texas, earned approximately $192,000 by selling pirated software and games online. However, he got caught--twice. And even though he got off with the settlement of a civil action suit the first time in 2001 (a settlement that included a written apology for his actions), this time he got the proverbial book thrown at him.

A US District Court of the District of Columbia judge sentenced Ponce de Leon to three years and 10 months in a federal prison and two years of supervised release. The judge also ordered Ponce de Leon to pay more than $1.15 million in restitution for criminal copyright infringement. The amount of the fine matches the cumulative retail value of the software Ponce de Leon pirated.

According to US Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, Ponce de Leon owned and operated the Web sites Powerbackups Ultimate Software Backup Resource and Softworks #1 Software Backup Service, from which he sold illegal copies of more than 200 different software and game titles. While Ponce de Leon sold games like Harry Potter 2 and NBA Live 2003, he also trafficked in copies of high-value PC software programs like Macromedia Flash MX (retail value $499), Adobe Photoshop 7 ($609), Lightwave 6 ($2,495), Autodesk Autocad 2004 ($3,750), and MS Windows 2K Datacenter ($26,000). Ponce de Leon requested leniency at his sentencing hearing, but was denied it because of his history of piracy.

Entertainment Software Association president Douglas Lowenstein today applauded the judge's sentence. "Sentences that include significant jail time send a clear message to software pirates that intellectual property theft is a serious crime and that perpetrators will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law," Lowenstein said.

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