In Mississippi: 15-Year Jail Sentence For Selling Pirated Movies and Music

New submitter patella.whack writes "A guilty plea for six counts of selling counterfeit media gets a defendant 15 years in Mississippi. An undercover reporter from the Attorney General's Intellectual Property Theft Task Force managed to buy a total of five copied movies and one music CD from the defendant, who had 10,500 pirated discs at home and two prior convictions: one for assaulting a police officer 17 years ago and one for CD piracy that got him a year under house arrest. Says the RIAA: '[This] highlights the fact that the individuals engaging in these activities are frequently serial criminals for whom IP theft is simply the most convenient and profitable way they could steal from others.' Frequently serial criminals? 15 years? I wonder how much of his sentence can be attributed to his priors rather than to other factors."

Comments

Three Strikes Laws

[Anonymous Coward]

These laws are dumb as shit since they make the judge irrelevant, as it takes away the courts power to hand down an appropriate sentence.

Mississippi is a three strikes state. So this is another "20 years for jaywalking" piece of nonsense.

Re:3 strikes and he's out

[icebike]

Easier sentence for murder? You realize that Federal punishment for second-degree murder is mandatory life imprisonment and first-degree is the death penalty or life imprisonment? Exaggerate much?

Federal penalties for murder seldom apply unless you cross a state line to commit same, or kill a mailman, and not even then in most cases.
Its a state charge, and many liberal states have you out on the street in less than 20 years, much less if their prisons are overcrowded.
(Don't even get me started on time off fir good behavior).

New York, Albany EDU did a study(pdf-2006) and found that 20 years (244 months) is the Average maximum sentence imposed by state courts in the US for Murder and Non-Negligent manslaughter.

Federal District courts in 2004 sentenced people to an average maximum of 111.2 months.
Post sentence guideline reform the federal average has increased to the state average, and then some. Figures for 2010 show an average of 23 years handed down by federal district courts.

So I don't know where you get that mandatory Life death penalty nonsense.