Home Boston Press Releases 2009 California Man Sentenced to Prison for Selling “Cracked” Software Online
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California Man Sentenced to Prison for Selling “Cracked” Software Online

U.S. Attorney’s Office October 08, 2009
  • District of Massachusetts (617) 748-3100

BOSTON, MA—A California man was sentenced today to one year in prison for running a business in which he sold illegally copied software via the Internet.

Acting United States Attorney Michael K. Loucks and Warren T. Bamford, Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation - Boston Field Division, announced today that GREGORY BAMBO, age 47, of Richmond, California, pled guilty today, before U.S. District Court Judge Rya W. Zobel, to a one-count Indictment charging him with criminal copyright infringement. BAMBO was also sentenced today to one year and one day in prison and three years supervise release.

The prosecutor told the Court that, had the case proceeded to trial, the evidence would have shown that, from 2005 to 2007, BAMBO sold software programs at far below the retail price. BAMBO had not bought this software from the manufacturers or through any legitimate channels but rather had illegally downloaded the software from websites or obtained it from other individuals. The software BAMBO sold was all “cracked”—meaning that the security devices the manufacturers used to prevent people from illegally copying the software had been broken or circumvented. BAMBO downloaded and offered for sale more than 1,400 cracked software programs, which had a combined retail value of approximately $600,000.

The case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. It was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Adam Bookbinder of Loucks’ Computer Crimes Unit.

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