Games fraudster rumbled by advert
A man downloaded computer games before burning them on to discs and selling them through an online site, a court heard.
Martin Beckett was caught by trading standards after an officer from Sandwell Council spotted a web advertisement for cheap games.
They discovered he was running a small-scale operation secretly from his mother's home in West Bromwich, in which he would download games onto his computer then cut them onto discs to order. Wolverhampton Crown Court yesterday heard that the trading standards officer contacted a number on the Gumtree advert, belonging to Beckett, and arranged to buy some games.
Mr Mark Jackson, prosecuting on behalf of Sandwell Council, said the officer then visited an address in Churchwell Gardens, West Bromwich, where he was greeted by Beckett who handed him the games he had ordered.
He also asked if Beckett, now aged 37, might have any others and he was shown a list of Xbox 360 and Wii games. Officers then obtained a search warrant, and on approaching the same address a man was seen leaving, who had just bought some of the games from Beckett.
His games were seized, as well as some others from inside the property, as well as counterfeited software.
Mr Jackson said: "What was going on here was effectively sell to order. He was advertising discs and as people indicated what they wanted from the lists, copies of games were stored on hardware, and he was effectively cutting the discs as people ordered them." His home address, on Telford Close in Hill Top, was also searched but nothing was found. Beckett admitted 17 counts of counterfeiting and sale of trademark console games.
Mr Jackson said trading standards accepted it was a 'relatively small scale operation'.
In Beckett's mitigation, his barrister Mr Ecky Tiwana said: "
It is low-level, it is unsophisticated, he advertised on Gumtree for everyone to see, and it is low profit." Judge Martin Walsh sentenced Beckett to a 34-week prison sentence suspended for two years, and ordered him to be electronically tagged to adhere to a four-month curfew. He also ordered Beckett to pay £500 towards the costs of his prosecution, despite costs running to more than £7,000, as he acknowledged he is a man of little means.
