John Williams, 72, of Pot Kiln Road, Great Cornard, near Sudbury, ordered to pay nearly £130,000 by Ipswich Crown Court after DVD counterfeiting

A DVD counterfeiter has been ordered to pay nearly £130,000 by a court after being found guilty of two offences.

John Williams, 72, of Pot Kiln Road, Great Cornard, near Sudbury, had more than 40,000 copied DVDs seized from his home in October 2021 following a Suffolk Trading Standards (STS) investigation, and also received a 16-month suspended prison sentence at Ipswich Crown Court today (January 9).

The head of the authority also said that Williams’ activities contributed to the downfall of the original complainant in the case, Network Distributing Ltd of London, which ceased trading last year with a cost of 30 jobs.

Titles examined by STS included Wonder Woman 1984, Shazam and X Men Apocalypse.

Graham Crisp, head of STS, said: “Williams, and those that supply counterfeit discs, contributed to Networks’ demise and have now actually limited the amount of cult TV and film available to purchase because these titles now remain in the archives and may never become available to the public.

“We found correspondence from Williams where he said that trading standards were only concerned with large-scale counterfeiters connected to organised crime and did not have the resources or time to come after people like him – he was wrong.

“When we find evidence of criminal activity we will always act.”

Williams was fined £7,500 and ordered to pay a Proceeds of Crime Order of £77,182 as well as prosecution costs of £42,870.

He was charged with two offences: making for sale or hire an article infringing copyright, and selling goods with sign/packaging bearing a sign identical/likely to be mistaken for registered trademark.

The offences come under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998 and the Trademark Act 1994 respectively.

Andrew Reid, cabinet member for public health, public protection and communities, said: “There is no such thing as a victimless crime and the greedy and selfish activities of this man contributed to the end of a company legitimately making cult films and TV shows available to the public.

“I applaud Suffolk Trading Standards for its hard work in bringing this totally unacceptable operation to a close.”

Analysis of Williams’ computers found he had sold the fakes when attending film and TV fairs, making up to £1,500 a fair.

As well as the computers and DVDs, disc burners, a colour photocopier with print outs of DVD box paper insert sleeves and address label stickers were seized.

Anyone wanting to report the sale of illegal goods should contact Trading Standards via Citizens Advice Consumer Service on 0808 223 1133.