Sept. 22, 2017 By Michael Florio
A Sunnyside resident who owns a music store in Corona has been charged for selling pirated music, according to the Queens District Attorney’s Office.
Evaristo Cruz, owner of Poblanos Record Corp., located at 95-10 Roosevelt Ave, allegedly sold illegally-downloaded music to an undercover investigator—via a SD media card.
“While some may ask what’s the harm? The fact of the matter is, downloading music without paying for it is a crime,” said Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown in a statement.
An undercover investigator for the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) entered the Roosevelt Avenue store on July 15th and asked Cruz about purchasing music. Cruz, allegedly, sold the investigator a SD media card for $30 that possessed 609 songs, including the music of Cuban salsa singer Rey Ruiz and the Colombian salsa band Grupo Niche.
“In the past, illegally downloaded music was sold on compact discs or CDs. Now songs are being distributed on even smaller devices – flash drives and memory cards,” Brown said.
The investigator returned to the store on September 2nd and once again inquired about purchasing music. This inquiry led to the arrest of Cruz’ employee Guevara Rubi who allegedly told the undercover investigator that he could purchase a USB drive with music on it for $40.
Later that day the investigator paid $40 and picked up the flash drive, which contained 512 songs, including a new song by Romeo Santos featuring rapper Nicki Minaj.
During a police search of the store on September 16th, a desktop computer was recovered along with 12 different memory devices ranging from 4 GB to 16 GB. The computer contained more than 1,000 music recordings that were counterfeited and/or pirated music, Brown said.
Cruz, who lives on 48th Street, was arraigned last week on charges of criminal possession of forgery devices and first-degree failure to disclose the origin of a recording. He faces up to seven years in prison if convicted and was ordered to return to court on October 20, 2015.
Rubi, a Corona resident, was also arraigned last week, on charges of first-degree failure to disclose the origin of a recording. She faces up to fours year in prison if convicted and also has to return to court on October 20th.
Both were released on their own recognizance.
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25 Comments
“The fact of the matter is, downloading music without paying for it is a crime,” said Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown in a statement.”
bullsh*t from old farts that are clueless! I’ve never paid for my music in years. I always have gotten it free thought rewards/points programs or through amazon giveaways.
Awe honestly this is sad, poor people were just trying to make a living. Why do officials go after these people and not the drug dealers on the south side of town ???
Murders, pedophiles, crackheads and crooked politicians go free and these guys face jail time.. What a joke.. Have them pay a fine, or do years of community services. But don’t waste our tax money and time with this bullshit.
On a side note RIAA is a joke.. The music industry is really missing their $70. which I want to know under what pretense did they get this poor guy turn over his kids ipod list. And if that’s the case we’re all guilty of downloading some songs from Napster back in the days.
Speak for yourself.
NeL is right. RIAA should foot the bill for bringing a civil action against Mr. Cruz to address this claimed intellectual property infringement. Our tax dollars and the limited resources of our criminal justice system would be better spent pursing the prosecution of criminals that are an actual threat to our health, safety and property. RIAA and the Motion Picture Association deploy a strategy of hiring retired police department members to influence PD to pursue these cases. They are gaming the system to prioritize these arrests and prosecutions with little, if any, value to the taxpayer at our expense.
why does anyone dislike my comments they speak the truth.
seven years??? what a gross waste of resources investigating illegally downloaded songs and sales. i bet loads of NYPD OT was used to inflate these officers pensions. well at least no one was choked.
Good job RIAA! You cracked the case wide open. I wonder if they conduct any “sting operations” on label execs who “leak” music online to gain some hype?
fortunately, they have no authority on albums made and sold internationally. this guy must have been selling RIAA music too, or else there would not have been a crack down.
The Obama Administration continues to harass hardworking business owners. The desire to make a simple profit now deserves jail time? While our conservative leaders are asleep at the wheel, the socialists are winning the war for America’s soul. If a man cares to sell the latest bachata/hip-hop mash up that no one really cares about and will never earn a royalty check, and he can find a buyer, more power to him, and God bless his entrepreneurial spirit.
That’s Liberty and that’s America, which our government seems to have forgotten a long time ago.
sk_nyc – does your argument apply to all businesses selling stolen or illegal products?
http://comicwatcher.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/piracy.png
That you Jim?
I nominate this reply as quite possibly the dumbest and most unintelligible point of view this year. The Sunnyside Post imbecile award goes to AK-NYC.
@Ak_nyc Dude you’re an idiot. The people producing music aren’t hard working musicians, mixers and technicians? The desire to make a profit isn’t always noble and or “legal”. The desire to make a profit is the motive behind the actions of hit men, pimps, drug dealers, con artist etc…That is not the definition of “liberty” or America. Fox News has really done damage to this country convincing under educated and the plain stupid they actually should voice their ignorant position in public. This conservative longs for the good old days when the stupid just kept their mouths shut and opinions to themselves so you didn’t know if they were stupid or just humble and quiet. Now these idiots just flaunt their ignorance proudly. Whatever happened to self respect? Silent Majority you are so right..
Oh ak_nyc I am truly embarrassed for you. Do you really believe that the Obama Administration is responsible for setting the priorities of the 110 pct of the NYPD or the Queens District Attorney’s Office? Do yourself a favor and switch off FOX news and get yourself reacquainted with the real world.
Mr. professor of English literature here, ladies and gentleman…. Waste of my bandwidth with crappy comments like this.
Yeah, let’s just let the rapists, robbers, druggies, dopers and real thieves walk the streets, but let’s catch this poor guy for swapping some media and throw him in jail for 7 years. He wasn’t smart enough, he should have sold the SD card and claim “I don’t know what’s in it, I am just selling the cards”. Oh well, I hope he gets out soon, because once he is in there, he will come out as real criminal. These investigators and cops, b*tches of the RIAA and not of the public.
You’ve deluded yourself into thinking that a crime didn’t occur with phrases like “swapping some media”. There’s a pretty big line to cross from pirating media for personal use to selling it for profit. 7 years is a bit harsh, but let’s not pretend the guy is innocent of wrongdoing here.
600+ salsa songs for 30 bucks, that sounds about right.
repetitive trash. somewhere in Corona, people will sleep better.
have a nice time in prison, amigo!
I suspect foul play.
And the chances that these two will return to court is zero. They have four different aliases that they use to receive “government assistance.”
I’m being politically correct by using government assistance instead of food stamps and welfare.
*Citation needed
You PC bro? Better check your privilege bro. If you have no idea what I am talking about, they you didnt watch the first episode of south park this season yet.
Maybe the self proclaimed ‘silent majority’ should remain silent until that have something informative to say (“Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.” – Abe Lincoln) In Actuality it is very likely that he will return to court. Mr. Cruz was recommended for release likely because of his verified communities ties. In addition he has hired private counsel to defend the case and will likely be offered a non jail plea offer. These are significant signs that he will return to court on October 20th, as scheduled. I don’t know Mr. Cruz but over 20 years of experience prosecuting and defending criminal cases tells me you have no clue what you are talking about.