Three UK software counterfeiters who styled themselves as "latter-day Robin Hoods" received lengthy prison sentences today over their role in infamous software piracy organisation DrinkorDie. Another defendant escaped with a suspended sentence after a hearing at London's Old Bailey.
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Former city bank worker Alex Bell, 29, of Chafford Hundred, Essex, was jailed for two and a half years by Judge Paul Focke for conspiracy to defraud. Steven Dowd, 39, of Newton-le-Willows, Merseyside, was sentenced to two years' imprisonment on the same charge. Both were found guilty by a jury in March at the end of a six-month software piracy trial. The Old Bailey heard that the duo were part of DrinkorDie, which brought us Windows 95 days before it was released among other exploits. Dowd and Bell, however, were tried over conspiracy to supply business software packages for functions such as financial planning or Computer Aided Design.
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Bell and Dowd were sentenced on Friday, 6 May along with two other men, Andrew Eardley, 35, an IT manager at a Staffordshire school, and London IT worker, Mark Vent, 30, who both pleaded guilty to related software piracy offences last year. Vent was jailed for 18 months over the conspiracy to defraud rap while Eardley escaped with an 18 month sentence, suspended for two years.