Pair jailed for sale of fake DVDs
POLICE responding to a disturbance at a rented house in Birmingham discovered it had been transformed into a “warehouse” for selling counterfeit DVDs.
And inquiries revealed that hundreds of people had been visiting the property to buy the bogus goods in what was a sophisticated and large scale operation.
Si Zheng, 22 and Weidi Cao, 23, both admitted charges under the Video Recordings and Trade Marks Act.
Zheng was jailed for 14 months and Cao for ten months by Mr Recorder J Harvey at Birmingham Crown Court who said: “It is quite clear the business in Erdington operated on a relatively large scale.”
Ben Mills, prosecuting, said the house in Hart Road was rented by Zheng in November 2007 and that it was quickly transformed into a warehouse for the onward sale of a large volume of counterfeit DVDs worth a total of £100,000.
Mr Mills said over a month, a neighbour saw Cao regularly park his car outside and deliver boxes of DVDs which he had collected from wholesalers in London.
She also saw lots of Chinese people arrive with trolleys and back packs while some would leave carrying blue plastic bags containing DVDs which would be sold on in pubs and at markets.
Sundays, she said, were particularly busy with up to 60 people visiting.
