Pictured: Mastermind of £7million Premier League streaming racket
Pictured: Moment ringleader who masterminded £7million Premier League streaming racket was caught at raid in his south London flat in his pyjamas – as gang are jailed for more than 30 years
Sitting on a sofa next to a table littered with empty crisp packets, takeaway containers and a shisha pipe – this is the unlikely mastermind of a £7million Premier League streaming racket.
Mark Gould, 36, ran the huge criminal operation from his flat in south London – where he is pictured in his pyjamas after being surprised by a police raid in May 2018.
He was described as the ‘prime mover’ in one of the UK’s largest illicit streaming scams and made millions selling £10-a-month TV sticks to over 50,000 customers and resellers.
Gould, who was jailed for 11 years yesterday at Chesterfield Crown Court, was caught with 30 linked set-top boxes that were used for the illegal operation.
He and co-conspirators Steven Gordon, Peter Jolley, William Brown and Christopher Felvus were all convicted of conspiracy to defraud, money laundering and contempt of court in the world’s largest ever prosecution of an illegal streaming network.
Mark Gould, 36, can be seen sitting in his pyjama bottoms surrounded by crisp packets, shisha pipes and cardboard boxes in May 2018 as investigators search his south London home
Bodycam footage also shows around 30 linked set-top boxes used for the illegal operation piled up at the property
A sixth gang member, Zak Smith, failed to appear at court for sentencing and a warrant has been issued for his arrest, the Premier League said.
The league added that the illegal streaming businesses had 30 employees, with one undercover at a specialist anti-piracy company.
Brown, from Stoke-on-Trent, denied the offences, claiming to have been an undercover informant acting in the interests of law enforcement authorities and broadcasters
But the 33-year-old was unanimously convicted by a jury after a seven-week trial as the Premier League said he used his technical skills to hack legitimate customers’ accounts to access and copy streams – intending for them to take the blame if identified by authorities.
Sentences given to the illegal streaming gang
Mark Gould – 11 year sentence, two counts of conspiracy to defraud and contempt of court
Steven Gordon – Five years nine months, two counts of conspiracy to defraud and contempt of court
Peter Jolley – Five years, two months – two counts of conspiracy to defraud and money laundering
Christopher Felvus – Three years, 11 months, two counts of conspiracy to defraud
William Brown – Four years, nine months, two counts of conspiracy to defraud
Zak Smith – Warrant issued for his arrest
The prosecution was supported by Hammersmith & Fulham Council’s trading standards team and the intellectual property protection organisation Fact.
Trading standards investigator Doug Love led a raid on Gould’s smart riverside flat in Greenwich, south London, in 2018.
He told BBC news: ‘I don’t think any of us realised how big it was. When we went into the spare bedroom, there were 20 or 30 set-top boxes linked together.’
The gang took feeds from broadcasters in the UK, Qatar, the US, Australia and Canada and streamed them a few seconds later via the Flawless service.
Between them, Gould, 36, Gordon, 46, Jolley, 41, Felvus, 36, Brown, 33, and Smith, 30, generated in excess of £7million between 2016 and 2021 through three pirate streaming organisations which offered illegal access to content including live Premier League matches.
Passing sentence, Judge Hurst outlined how the group charged £10 per month for the service.
A similar subscription with Sky Sports and BT Sports – the current Premier League rights holders in the UK – would cost in the range of £60-£80 per month.
In handing down the sentences, the judge described a sophisticated offence involving significant planning and expertise, which involved the hacking of legitimate customers in the UK and abroad.
The gang’s company Flawless 1, which operated between 2016 and 2018, was at the time the largest illegal IPTV service in the UK, providing over 300 channels with 24/7 customer service for £10 per month.
It was estimated to have had 50,000 customers including a network of reseller businesses (who provided the services for £6 per month) and made £4.6million in just under two years, of which Gould took in excess of £1.7million.
In 2018, a breakaway service known as ‘Optimal’ was launched by Gordon and Jolley after a pay dispute between Gordon and Gould however it ultimately failed due to Gould and Brown sabotaging the service by infecting its servers with malware.
Flawless 2 also known as ‘Shared VPS’, was subsequently launched by Gould, Felvus and Brown after the initial arrest of Gould and made £2.6million between May 2018 and July 2021.
The Flawless on-screen menu, showing matches available on the illegal streaming service
Significant steps were taken by the trio to conceal the service, with Brown employed to perform a range of roles including helping Flawless avoid detection by the authorities, hacking broadcasters and their legitimate subscribers, alongside stealing content from rival illegal services.
Shared VPS was uncovered after Birmingham Trading Standards arrested one of the major Flawless resellers, following a Premier League & FACT investigation.
Evidence was identified of payments being made to a PayPal account in the name of Shared-VPS, before they moved to bitcoin.
That account was linked to Gould as investigations, amongst other things, showed the account being used to order take-away food and electrical goods to Gould’s home address.
The investigation and prosecution was taken by the Premier League and supported by the intellectual property protection organisation FACT and Hammersmith and Fulham Trading Standards, who led a series of enforcement raids and arrests at eight addresses across the country in 2018.
Evidence seized from Felvus’ computers also established that he was in possession of indecent child imagery, which led to a separate prosecution.
In January 2021, he pleaded guilty to three charges of possession of an indecent photograph of a child and to committing 13 acts of voyeurism for which he received a custodial sentence and was placed on the sex offenders’ register for 10 years.
Jolley, from Skelmersdale, Lancashire, was jailed for five years and two months for two counts of conspiracy to defraud and one count of money laundering after hiding £500,000 in his parents’ bank accounts.
Gordon, 46, from Morecambe, was jailed for five years and nine months for two counts of conspiracy to defraud.
Felvus, from Pontypool in Monmouthshire, pleaded guilty to two counts of conspiracy to defraud and was jailed for three years and 11 months.
Brown was jailed for four years and nine months for two counts of conspiracy to defraud.
Kevin Plumb, Premier League General Counsel said: ‘Today’s sentencing is the result of a long and complex prosecution of a highly sophisticated operation.
‘The sentences handed down, which are the longest sentences ever issued for piracy-related crimes, vindicate the efforts made to bring these individuals to justice and reflect the severity and extent of the crimes.’
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