Harshest sentence in SA history against DVD pirate

Marcus Mocke was convicted in the Johannesburg Commercial Crimes Court in terms of the Counterfeit Goods Act and was sentenced to a fine of R400 000 or eight years in jail.

This follows a raid in March by the Johannesburg Commercial Crime Task Force in which 400 pirated DVDs and Playstation games were seized from Mocke. The court heard that Mocke was both distributing and trading pirated goods in flea markets, stores and on the street.

Advocate Andrew Chauke, newly-appointed head of the Commercial Crime Court, said that his team had been working on the case for six months. "We're very happy with the sentence. It's a start and we'll be looking for more sentences like this."

Fred Potgieter, head of the SA Federation Against Copyright Theft (Safact), said that Mocke had been under investigation for several years. "This is a landmark decision and a major breakthrough in the war against piracy," he said.

"This is evidence of a new spirit of co-operation between the legal authorities and the SA film and computer game industries. We are determined to fight piracy at every level."

Safact has warned that at least half of all DVDs sold in SA are illegal pirated copies. More than 500 000 pirated DVDs were removed from the SA streets last year alone, more than double the total number confiscated during the whole of last year.

Safact is currently running a R10-million marketing campaign against piracy. Full details of the war against piracy can be found on the "Crimesucks" and Safact websites as follows:

www.crimesucks.co.za
www.safact.co.za