Developer Of HU Loader Pleads Guilty In Satellite Television Piracy Case

cybercrime.gov, Oct 03, 2006

Dorsett developed a means of illicitly modifying DirecTV HU cards using a device that came to be known as an HU loader.

James K. Vines, United States Attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee, announced that Brian Matthew Dorsett, 27, of Fort Wayne, Indiana, entered a plea of guilty in federal court today to charges that he conspired with others to sell and distribute devices primarily of assistance in the unauthorized decryption of DirecTV satellite television programming.

Dorsett faces up to five years imprisonment, restitution of up to $800,000, and a period of supervised release of up to three years following his imprisonment. Dorsett is presently serving a 30-month federal sentence for his conviction in the Southern District of Florida for conspiracy to commit access device fraud in a case involving the sale of devices used in the unauthorized decryption of DirecTV Latin America satellite television programming.

According to testimony at the guilty plea hearing today, in about November of 2000, Dorsett developed a means of illicitly modifying DirecTV "HU cards" using a device that came to be known as an "HU loader." In about November and December of 2000, Dorsett and Donald R. Nance II began to illicitly modify "HU cards" to enable viewing of all DirecTV channels without payment of the required subscription fees or pay-per-view fees to DirecTV and charged approximately $200 for each "HU card" thus modified. Read more at cybercrime.gov