Suspects in 'cloned' software deal plead not guilty to charges

The American national and his Cebuano business partner, arrested by the National Bureau of Investigation last year, appeared in court Friday afternoon and pleaded not guilty to the charges of manufacturing and selling of pirated computer software.

Lawyer Gerardo "Gerry" Carillo accompanied Kevin Wayne Cunningham and Rommel Ocariza in filing their plea before Regional Trial Court-branch 11 acting Judge Gabriel Ingles.

Carillo told the court his clients are willing to present evidences to dispute the indictment filed against them by a computer distribution firm, Thrust Enterprises and Industrial Sales, at the NBI last October 13, which was 10 days after they were arrested.

Cunningham, a resident of 1816 Boylston Avenue in Seattle but currently residing on Bontores Street in barangay Basak Pardo, and Ocarisa, of barangay Sambag 1, are out on bail.

The two suspects were caught in an entrapment in barangay Lorega-San Miguel as they delivered several pieces of "cloned" Microsoft Windows XP software to a female agent of the NBI who posed as a buyer from another computer firm.

The NBI team that arrested the two said the confiscated software was worth about P9-million but Thrust downgraded the damage cost to avoid paying higher filing fees in court.

Microsoft Corporation later confirmed that the seized software were cloned or a misrepresentation of its popular product.

Rubico Besario Jr. and Jezzamine Daclison, Thrust's operations and marketing manager, respectively, facilitated the "sale" between their firm and the two partners, Cunningham and Ocarisa.

Besario and Daclison said the firm's source of Windows XP software was Cunningham who was earlier introduced to them as the authorized representative of the US-based JJC Trading Corp., a distributor of Microsoft.

Later on however, Thrust found that the items sold were defective prompting the firm to suspect the products were spurious.

Cunningham and Ocarisa also failed to comply with the firm's demand for a Microsoft certificate to distribute. This prompted Thrust to seek the help of the NBI. - Rene U. Borromeo