CHINESE LIVE STREAMER SENTENCED TO ALMOST 2 YEARS PRISON TERM FOR SELLING COUNTERFEIT PLUSH TOYS
25 May 2023
China
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In December 2022, the Jing An District Procuratorate prosecuted 6 people for selling counterfeit toys during their live streams. A few days later, the Jing An District Court sentenced internet celebrity Zhu with more than 200,000 fans and 17 years of selling experience to one year and ten months imprisonment and a fine of 800,000 yuan. The Jing An District Procuratorate official came across Zhu’s live broadcast on a short video platform, where consumers could buy toys worth hundreds of yuan in the market for only a few tens of yuan. After an investigation, the case was transferred to the public security bodies for supervision. At the same time, the suspicious toys were bought in the above-mentioned store and reported to the police. After the police filed the case, they conducted multiple investigations and collected evidence. On August 10, 2022, Zhu was arrested whilst carrying goods. The police seized more than 800 items of toys bearing the "DISNEY" word mark, which were all counterfeit registered trademarks. According to Zhu, most of the sold goods were fake and he did not obtain the official authorization. The provided English authorization letter by the purchaser was also fake. In case a customer asks whether the toys are genuine online, Zhu’s staff avoided this question and called the toys not by their original name, but “rabbits and foxes”. On September 9, 2022, the public security agency transferred the case to the Jing’an District Procuratorate for review and arrest Zhu and others for selling goods with counterfeit registered trademarks. From April 2021 to August 2022, the total amount of counterfeit sales in Zhu's live broadcast was more than 3 million yuan, and the value of the seized goods was more than 30,000 yuan. |