EliteRorrents Admin Faces 18 Months in Jail

EliteRorrents Admin Faces 18 Months in Jail

Daniel Dove, administrator of the EliteTorrents BitTorrent tracker site, was formally sentenced by the U.S District Court Judge Judge James P. Jones to 18 months in prison and fined $20,000.  In addition, Dove was ordered to serve three years of supervised release.


Dove's arrest is part of the US Department of Justice's "Operation D-Elite" which pursued EliteTorrents administrators. The case goes all the way back to 2005 where 10 people were served warrants for copyright infringements. On June 27th, 2008, Dove was convicted by a federal jury in Big Stone Gap, Va., on one count each of conspiracy and felony copyright infringement, facing 10 years in prison. 

EliteTorrents was singled out among the large number of Bittorrent websites due to its released of Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith workprint approximately six hours prior to the movie's theatrical release. This caught the attention of the MPAA, which monitors BitTorrent sites. The MPAA began gathering information and pressuring the Federal Bureau of Investigation to take some form of action.