Confessions of an Elite Pirate

The BitTorrent community used to think that law enforcement had better things to do than hunt them down, but that all changed in mid-2005, when US-based EliteTorrents was raided by the FBI and ICE. The site had over 130,000 users, and was run by a small number of dedicated staff, including one 19 year-old who recently spoke about the ordeal. He gives a peek inside the first big Torrent bust of what has become an ongoing war on piracy for US law enforcement.

May 25th 2005 was the day the FBI and ICE went after EliteTorrents. After shutting down the site, agents arrived at the homes of the EliteTorrent staff, StonyVision included. The 19 year-old lawyered up and started fighting back. The prosecutor had ample evidence, and was seeking a prison sentence as high as 5 years. StonyVision is the first to admit he was lucky to get a sympathetic judge, and was able to avoid jail time. He payed a $3500 fine, served 6-months house arrest, and 3-years of probation in which he was unable to touch a computer.

Source:
http://techtime.posterous.com/confessions-of-an-elite-pirate