Georgia Man Sentenced to 6 Years in Jail for Selling Fake 'Frankenstein' Posters
Passing off vintage movie posters and lobby cards as authentic on eBay amounts to how many years in prison?
The punishment for murder ranges from a few years in prison to the death penalty, depending on the state where the crime is committed. But what if there isn't a murder? What if instead someone wants to take an old poster of a horror movie with bloodshed, create a copy and pass it off as an original for sale on the Internet? What's the penalty for that?
It turns out 6 1/2 years in prison. That's how much jail time a Georgia man has received for forging horror movie posters and lobby cards and selling them on eBay.
Kerry Haggard, 47, was arrested in April 2011. According to the indictment, he devised a scheme to fraudulently sell these nostalgia items as authentic. Later details from the case indicated that he used a New York digital printing company to replicate posters for movies such as Frankenstein and Son of Frankenstein, and earned about $1.3 million by selling these items at prices up to $5,000.
His big legal error turned out that he used the U.S. Postal Service to deliver the items. That, and perhaps the arrogant belief that his buyers would never attempt to get the items authenticated by experts.
In October, he pleaded guilty to one count of mail fraud.
On Monday, according to
a report in a local Atlanta newspaper, a judge sentenced him to 78 months in prison, plus three years of supervised release, plus the forfeiture of $1.38 million.
