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The US court ruling in Virginia marks the first time that a jury has delivered a guilty verdict in a copyright infringement case, announcing that Daniel Dove was guilty of felony copyright infringement as well as conspiracy.

Dove was found to have been an administrator for the EliteTorrents.org website which distributed torrent files for pre-release movies.

The site proved hugely popular during its operation, attracting over 100,000 users who downloaded over a million movies in total, according to prosecutors in the case.

It regularly released films that were unavailable elsewhere, and was accused of distributing the Star Wars movie Revenge of the Sith six hours before its official release, whereupon 10,000 people downloaded it illegally.

However, the site was shut down by authorities in 2005, with considerable help from the Motion Picture Association of America.

Dove will be sentenced in September, and could theoretically receive a sentence of up to ten years for his crimes.