Pirating investigation leads to PC swap meet arrests

Five people were arrested Saturday in connection to an investigation into pirated video and compact disc sales at the Porterville College swap meet.

Police arrested a 17-year-old female; Aide Gonzalez, 33, and Sigfredo Venga, 34, both of Los Angeles; Porfilio Perez-Garcia, 46, of Woodville; and Jesus Perez De Real, 29, of Fresno, as a result of the investigation.

Four were arrested on suspicion of counterfeit trademark violations and a fifth was arrested for allegedly giving authorities false name and address information.

The four adults remained behind bars Monday evening, a Tulare County Jail official said — Gonzalez with a $20,000 bail, Venga with a $125,000 bail and Perez-Garcia and De Real with $10,000 bails.

Information about the juvenileÂ’s jail status was unavailable.

At about 10:30 a.m. Saturday, Porterville police detectives from the General Investigations Unit and investigators from Pacific Resources, a contract company with the Motion Picture Association of America and the Recording Industry Association of America, conducted a joint operation targeting pirated video and compact disc sales at the Porterville College swap meet, the release indicated.

As a result of the operation, detectives seized more than 12,000 pirated videos and compact discs with an estimated retail value of about $203,851.

Lt. Dan Haynes said pirating videos, DVDs and CDs is a federal violation and an infringement on copyright laws.

“There is an FBI warning on any video at the heading,” Haynes said. “Most people don’t pay attention to it, but if you read it, you will see codes addressing copyrighting.

“While we primarily pursue state charges, federal charges can actually apply to that.”

Anyone with information about the case is asked to Detective Rick Carrillo at 782-7400.

Contact Kara D. Machado at 784-5000, Ext. 1047, or karam@portervillerecorder.com.