An Auckland internet cafe director found guilty of illegally reproducing and showing movies without permission has been sentenced to seven months home detention on multiple copyright offences.
Yongming Nie, 43, the director of HTC Internet Cafe, was also ordered to pay $10,210 to the New Zealand Federation Against Copyright Theft (NZ Fact) when he was sentenced at Auckland District Court today.
The 37 charges involved allegations that HTC provided facilities where members of the public, upon payment of fees, were viewing movies on computer terminals.
It was suspected that the movies were reproduced and shown without the permission of copyright owners.
The movies included The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (partially filmed in New Zealand), Iron Man and Wall-E.
It was believed Nie's case was the first where an internet cafe director was sentenced on piracy charges.
