Two men may have found an easy way to steal music royalties from YouTube: pretend to be the owner of obscure Spanish music.
The duo has been charged with allegedly running a music royalty scheme for several years by claiming to own more than 50,000 Spanish-language songs, according to the Department of Justice.
The pair, Jose "Chanel" Teran, 36, of Scottsdale, Arizona, and Webster "Yenddi" Batista, 38, of Doral, Florida, collected more than $20 million in royalties over several years through a third-party royalty management firm.
Prosecutors say Teran and Batista claimed their company, MediaMuv Inc., controlled the rights to a relatively large back catalog of songs. The duo allegedly approached a third-party royalty management firm with the initials "A.R." on Feb. 13, 2017, claiming they controlled the music's rights.
The royalty management firm handled the royalties for a company identified as "Y.T.," according to Gizmodo. While federal prosecutors do not directly name Youtube, the method of royalty collection resembles that of Youtube, reports Gizmodo.
In some cases, Teran and Batista forged notes from artists claiming they had the rights to manage the music. The indictment alleges the pair "did not pay anything to the top 30 artists or their representatives, whose music generated royalties that the defendants collected."
The music collection reportedly includes music from the popular video game Doki Doki Literature Club, according to tweets from game developer Team Salvato in 2019.
The pair also allegedly used other people's identities to imply MediaMuv Inc. employed more people than just Teran and Batista, according to federal prosecutors.
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Teran appeared before the court on Wednesday, the Arizona DOJ reports.
If convicted, Teran and Batista could face "up to 5 years in prison for Conspiracy, up to 20 years for Wire Fraud, up to 10 years for Transactional Money Laundering, and a mandatory consecutive sentence of 2 years for Aggravated Identity Theft," according to federal prosecutors. They could also be fined up to $250,000 per felony conviction.