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A computer programmer who was among many who operated an illegal streaming service that the government claims “affected every major television program copyright owner in the United States” was convicted in federal court Thursday, federal prosecutors announced.
The defendant, who was convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement, is the eighth and final defendant to be convicted in the case, according to a Justice Department news release.
According to court records and evidence presented at trial, Yoany Vaillant, 43, worked as a computer programmer for Jetflicks, an online, subscription-based service headquartered in Las Vegas.
This operation allowed subscribers to stream and sometimes download copyrighted television episodes without permission from the copyright owners.
Jetflicks claimed to have 183,285 different television episodes, far more than Netflix, Hulu, Vudu, Amazon Prime, Disney+ or any other licensed streaming service, according to the press release.
At Jetflicks, Vaillant worked directly with Kristopher Dallmann and Jared Jaurequi, who were convicted of criminal copyright infringement earlier this year, the press release said.
“Evidence at trial showed that Vaillant and his co-conspirators scoured the Internet for infringing television programming from pirate sites – including some of the largest sites specializing in infringing content such as The Pirate Bay, RARBG, altHUB and Nzbplanet – using of automated software. and computer scripts that ran non-stop,” the press release said.
“Vaillant and his co-conspirators reproduced hundreds of thousands of copyrighted television episodes without permission and streamed the infringing programs to tens of thousands of paying subscribers in the United States, often providing episodes to subscribers the day after the shows originally aired on television. ” said DOJ.
Vaillant was one of eight defendants charged in 2019 in the Eastern District of Virginia for allegedly running Jetflicks. Vaillant’s co-defendant Darryl Polo, a computer programmer, pleaded guilty to four criminal copyright charges and one money laundering charge related to Jetflicks and another illegal streaming site he operated.
Co-defendant Luis Villarino, also a computer programmer, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement at Jetflicks. The court sentenced Polo to four years and nine months in prison and Villarino to one year and one day in prison.
In February 2022, the court transferred the case to the District of Nevada.
The court separated Vaillant’s case from the other five defendants — Dallmann, Jaurequi, Douglas Courson, Felipe Garcia and Peter Huber — and those defendants went on trial in Las Vegas last June.
Dallmann led the Jetflicks operation with help from Jaurequi and Courson; Garcia was in charge of customer support and helped obtain television show content; and Huber provided computer programming services. A jury found all five defendants guilty of conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement, and Dallmann was also found guilty of three additional counts of criminal copyright infringement and two counts of money laundering by concealment .
It was the largest internet piracy case by volume of infringing works – and the first illegal streaming case – ever to go to trial, DOJ said.
The court will sentence Dallmann, Courson, Garcia, Jaurequi, Huber and Vaillant on February 3 and 4.
Contact Marvin Clemons at [email protected].