A student from Pwani University was charged with converting online versions of the Standard Newspaper into PDF and selling them to the public.
Silvans Omondi, a 23-year-old IT student appeared before Chief magistrate Hestone Nyaga, on charges of copyright infringement of the Standard Newspaper. Silvans is said to have committed the offence on the dates between September 9th and 15th with others who were not before the court.
According to an article appearing on the standard newspaper this morning, “Omondi unlawfully made soft copies of the newspaper with the intent to defraud, which he falsely purported to have been issued by the Standard Group PLC.”
When the matter was reported to the authorities, it was discovered that Silvans had been buying the online daily paper, which he was converting to PDF from Flips Form, which he would allegedly sell to his customers at Sh10 or Sh20 per copy, on a WhatsApp group dubbed, ‘Standard PDF 20’.
The cash was received via M-Pesa, which officers discovered after seeking orders to investigate Silvans’s M-Pesa statements for the months of June to September 11. Officers also confiscated one of the phones he allegedly used to convert the e-paper into PDF.
Silvans Omondi, however, denied the charges and was released on a personal bond of Sh200,000 pending hearing of the case on March 12, next year.