KANSAS CITY, KAN. – A California man pleaded guilty today to
unlawfully selling copyrighted aviation data updates, U.S. Attorney Stephen
McAllister.
Craig M. Vincent, 51, Stockton, Calif., pleaded guilty to
one count of criminal infringement of a copyright.
In his plea, Vincent admitted he used eBay to resell
aviation navigational database updates in violation of Jeppesen Company’s
licensing agreement for a trademarked product called NavData. Jeppesen is a
Boeing subsidiary. Jeppesen’s NavData includes airport information, runway
characteristics, waypoints, arrival routes, departure routes, terminal
procedures and general information that a Global Positioning System or flight
management computer needs to navigate an airplane to final destination.
Jeppesen sold NavData subscriptions to Kansas-based Garmin,
Inc. Garmin received a commission from the sales of Jeppesen data sets. Doing
business as Merlin Enterprises, Vincent sold NavData cards and required
customers to return old data cards to him.
Sentencing is set for Oct. 15. He faces up to five years in
federal prison and a fine up to $250,000. The FBI investigated. Assistant U.S.
Attorney Chris Oakley is prosecuting.
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