Hong Kong/Beijing – The Chinese government has sentenced a retailer of pirated movies to one year imprisonment and a RMB10,000 (US$1,430) fine in its first publicized conviction of pirates. The 40-year-old convict, Zhou Cheng, was arrested December 15, 2007 for alleged sale of pirated DVDs in the Chaoyang district of Beijing. The raid conducted by the Public Security Bureau saw 10,934 DVDs seized, of which 849 infringed titles from Motion Picture Association (MPA) member companies including American Gangster, Transformers and Spiderman 3. The remaining discs were classified as illegal publications. Mike Ellis, president and managing director, Asia-Pacific, MPA, said, “Well-publicized criminal convictions with deterrent custodial sentences are an essential element of any strategy to discourage piracy and protect the creative industries. While welcoming the result and acknowledging the great effort that went into this case, it will be meaningless unless authorities throughout China follow through with many more similar cases.”