Some guy who ran a six-figure game-copying operation from his home pleaded guilty and will do about a year in the slammer, mostly because he was also popped for drugs and child endangerment.
Wait, child endangerment? What the hell was this guy pirating, Vampire Rain: Altered Species? Legendary? Haze? [Update: Commenter Habits found more on this story. The guy is even stupider than originally thought.]
One Khuong Van Truong, of San Jose, pleaded guilty in superior court to counterfeiting more than 11,000 video games, 4,000 DVDs, and 300 audio CDs (I mean, really, they had to get him for CDs?) The ESA helpfully stepped in and valued the pirated games at about $420,000, saying he likely made a ton of dough each month selling them online. No doubt this guy was a criminal, but you know, "street value" declarations are pure propaganda. Receipts or GTFO.
Another story (do a word search for Truong) has it that Truong's piracy scheme was discovered only after he'd let his unattended 2-year-old son wander out of the house and into an intersection. The cops came, noticed he had shitloads of bootlegs laying about, I guess, and that started his downfall. (Thanks, reader Habits).
Truong's sentencing is Feb. 3. A radio station says he might only get a year. He better keep his trap shut and his head down, I hear that guys who endanger children by selling pirated video games are constant targets in the pen.
Heavyeweight Game Pirate Gets Light Sentence [GamePolitics]