For a brief period between January 2008 and June 2009, 19-year-old Wolverhampton songwriter Lamar Johnson was living the high life.  His musical royalties from iTunes and Amazon were sky-high, with Johnson raking in a staggering $780,700 dollars (or 500,000 pounds) in royalties.  As it turns out, those royalties were ill-gotten.  Lamar Johnson and nine other men were using stolen credit cards to buy Johnson’s music on iTunes and Amazon and rake in ill-gotten royalties.

Really, it’s a genius idea.  Johnson and company downloaded Johnson’s song 6000 times, which allowed Johnson to rake in semi-legal royalties for his music.  Granted, they used stolen credit cards to buy the music, but the royalties themselves were legal.  Johnson, who is doing 5 years in jail at the moment for grievous bodily harm, plead guilty to conspiracy to defraud charges in relation to the music royalties scam.

Royalties are a big deal, no matter the industry.  I guess that’s why record companies are trying so hard to stop illegal downloads.  If 6000 downloads makes you nearly $800,000, imagine how much cash a million downloads would bring in!

Tags: Lamar Johnson, Wolverhampton, United Kingdom, England, iTunes, Amazon, teenager uses stolen credit cards to buy his own music, royalties, royalties scam, teen steals credit cards to buy his own music, fraud, credit card scams, stolen credit cards used to get music royalties, royalties from stolen credit cards

I’ve never had a problem eating food from a gas station.  Just two weeks ago, I ate a couple of hot dogs purchased from a gas station.  They were delicious.  That’s not the first time I’ve eaten gas station food, and I doubt it will be the last.  There’s nothing like a fun food novelty. […]

Commissioner Roger Goodell gathered 32 NFL owners for one big question.  One of the league’s most wanderlust-stricken franchises is looking to move again.  The Oakland-Los Angeles-Oakland Raiders, tired of gutting it out in a run-down stadium, were once again looking for greener pastures.  Only the Miami Dolphins refused to cooperate.  With a vote of 31-1, […]

In 2006, an injury to Dallas Cowboys starting quarterback Drew Bledsoe opened the door for an undrafted free agent by the name of Tony Romo to take the helm of America’s Team and lead the Dallas Cowboys to an early playoff exit.  Bledsoe went from starter to afterthought in a season.  Now, the circle continues […]

For 89 years, Oscars has never had a major mistake.  The last few Oscars might have had a few flubs, but at least they never got the most important category of the night wrong.  Well, that’s now changed, all thanks to OG Bonnie and Clyde legends Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway.  When Faye Dunaway called […]

Tom Brady has been wildly successful, if controversial.  He’s the first quarterback ever to win five Super Bowls and only the second player to do so after Charles Haley.  Unlike Haley, Brady won all his Super Bowls with the same team, the New England Patriots.  The only thing that seems to be able to stop […]

Ben Affleck, no matter what you might think of him, is a talented actor and director.  He’s got the goods, but he’s smart enough to know when he’s in over his head.  All along, since he took on the mantle of Batman, he’s had his eyes on writing, directing, and starring as the Caped Crusader. […]

In May, students for the for-profit American College of Education were running into some problems.  Their access to email accounts and course information was locked down by Google, who had disabled their accounts.  The reason why?  A fired IT worker for the American College of Education locked the school out of their Google cloud account. […]