(credit: Aurich Lawson)
The two lawyers said to be the masterminds behind Prenda Law, Paul Hansmeier and John Steele, have been arrested and charged with a multimillion-dollar extortion scheme.
US Attorney Andrew Luger of Minnesota announced charges against them in Minneapolis this morning shortly after both men were arrested, according to the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. Hansmeier was arrested in the Twin Cities, while Steele was arrested in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.
“In order to carry out the scheme, the defendants used sham entities to obtain copyrights to pornographic movies—some of which they filmed themselves—and then uploaded those movies to file-sharing websites in order to lure people to download the movies,” the indictment reads, according to the newspaper.
Read 5 remaining paragraphs | Comments
Source: Ars Technica – Breaking: Prenda Law “copyright trolls” Steele and Hansmeier arrested