The guy who decided to pirate X-Men Origins: Wolverine gets a year in prison

Last Updated on August 5, 2021

Remember that guy who uploaded the unfinished copy of X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE? Well, they’ve finally handed him his punishment.

The pirate in question, Gilberto Sanchez admitted back in 2009 that he bought the film on a street corner near his home in the Bronx. In March, Sanchez plead guilty to one count of uploading a copyrighted work being prepared for commercial distribution. He went on to state that he spread the file to Megaupload.com and various other sites. In the prosecutors statements, they spoke of the “damage” that was done in such a short amount of time, “Although Fox was able to get defendant’s Wolverine workprint removed from his Megaupload account within approximately one day, by then, the damage was done and the film had proliferated like wildfire throughout the Internet, resulting in up to millions of infringements.”

Sanchez was sentenced to one year in federal prison by sentenced by U.S. District Judge Margaret Morrow, who described his actions as “extremely serious.”

United States Attorney André Birotte Jr. sees this as a warning to all the pirates out there, “The federal prison sentence handed down in this case sends a strong message of deterrence to would-be Internet pirates. The Justice Department will pursue and prosecute persons who seek to steal the intellectual property of this nation.”