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20th April 2023
11:28am BST
A man jailed for more than three years and fined $14.5 (£11.6m) for his role in a Nintendo hacking group has been released from jail, but his punishment is far from over.
Gary Bowser now has to pay the company 25-30 per cent of his salary every month until the debt is paid off.
Bowser was jailed in 2021- after being indicted in 2020 alongside Max Louarn and Yuanning Chen - for being part of Team Xecuter, which sold chips allowing gamers to play pirated games.
Despite reportedly having a lesser role in the enterprise, as its marketing and PR manager, Bowser was the only one of the trio convicted in the US. Chen, a Chinese national, was never arrested; Louarn was never successfully extradited to the US.
Bowser initially faced 11 charges but pled guilty to two. He was sentenced to a $4.5 million fine and later a $10 million additional fine as well as handed prison time.
Just over a year into his sentence, Bowser was released on 28 March, apparently, in part, due to good behaviour.
In a recent interview with podcaster Nick Moses, Bowser said he was currently in a detention awaiting processing before being sent home to Canada.
Of the millions he owes, Bowser told Moses that he had paid off $175 (£140). He was making $25 (£20) monthly instalments from the money he was making working in the prison library.
If the 53-year-old returns to work in Canada, his pay will be docked until the debt is cleared. Bowser's agreement with Nintendo requires him to pay the company 25-30 per cent of his pay.
Previously, Bowser stated that while Team Xecuter earned "at least tens of millions of dollars of proceeds," he himself only received a small fraction of that, IGN reported.
During Bowser's trial, US District Judge Robert Lasnick reportedly said that Bowser's sentence was in part "a message" to deter other hackers.
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