By Mark Baber
August 21 – Two men were sentenced to 3 ½ years in prison for selling BSkyB viewing cards for Premier League football matches, intended for domestic use, to pubs and other businesses.
The sentences were handed down to Simon Hopkins and Leon Passlow at Guildford Crown Court after the pair had pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit fraud between January 2008 and September 2012, in a prosecution brought by the Football Association Premier League (FAPL).
Hopkins and Passlow ran a company which obtained hundreds of domestic use only BSkyB cards, using hundreds of fake names, and sold them on to pubs, betting shops and yachts, causing an estimated loss in earnings to BSkyB of £591,000.
A Premier League spokesman responded to the sentences saying: “A three-and-a-half-year custodial sentence sends a clear message: supplying systems which enable unauthorised broadcasts of Premier League football to be made in commercial premises is illegal.
“The supplier in this case – Digicam – was fraudulently selling cards intended for home use to commercial premises to enable unauthorised broadcasts of Premier League football.
“This judgment serves as a reminder to the pub industry, and other businesses which show live football, that Sky Sports and BT Sport are the only authorised broadcasters of live Premier League football in the UK.”
Detective Sergeant Chris Rambour, from Surrey Police’s economic crime unit, emphasised the efforts the police had put into the case said: “This was a complex investigation which involved working closely with our partners to see that these criminals were put behind bars.
“We will now be pursuing further action under the Proceeds of Crime Act to confiscate any assets acquired by the defendants as a result of these offences.”
One wonders if similar efforts had been put into investigating the piracy of OnDigital cards and the allegations of Murdoch and NDS involvement (publicised by BBC Panorama and others), if the media landscape in the UK might look somewhat different today.
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