It’s A Bad Week To Be A Former Admin Of A Torrent Site

It was almost a year ago when the cute-avatar-adorned BitTerrorist hub OiNK got shut down by British and Dutch law enforcement, and today, former OiNK admin Alan Ellis was charged with conspiracy to defraud, while at least two former users of the site were charged with copyright infringement by the British authorities. (I’m sure some still-weeping OiNK fan has already made a semi-tortured 9/11 reference, if precedent is any indication.)

Ellis hasn’t been brought up on any copyright-related charges, but the two users (of six who were arrested in May) were each charged because they each uploaded one album. Speculation that those albums were pre-release recordings is rife, although no statement has been issued by British authorities yet. But the news of the charges is, of course, causing the kiddies at TorrentFreak to crap their collective diaper call for “civil disobedience,” including “taking hard copies of CDs and dropping them in the streets in random places.” Uh… OK.

In news closer to home, one of the admins of EliteTorrents, which was shut down three years ago, was sentenced to 18 months in prison yesterday after being convicted on federal charges of conspiracy and felony copyright infringement. He’ll also be on probation for three years and have to pay $20,000.

OiNK Admin Charged With Conspiracy To Defraud [TorrentFreak] OiNK Uploaders Charged With Copyright Infringement [TorrentFreak] EliteTorrents Admin Sentenced To 18 Months In Prison [Digital Media Wire]