Barefoot Bandit can't profit from crime spree but studio pays $1M restitution to tell his life story
When the so-called Barefoot Bandit took a plea in 2011, part of the deal was that the then 20-year-old could not profit from his two-year crime spree, ABC News reported at the time.
However, a Hollywood studio was allowed to pay $1 million in restitution to victims on behalf of Colton Harris-Moore, in exchange for the right to tell his life story, reports the Seattle Times. The agreement says he agreed to “forfeit the intellectual property rights” concerning a highly publicized series of teenage crimes that included stealing several small planes and leading police on a chase that started in Washington state and ended in the Bahamas.
The Everett Herald and the Hollywood Reporter say the deal with 20th Century Fox was made in 2011. However, the studio paid only a little over $135,000 in 2012, and the remaining $900,000 was paid earlier this month, the Times reports.
When Harris-Moore was sentenced in 2012 in federal court in Washington to six and a half years in prison, U.S. Attorney Jenny Durkan said he would not profit from his crimes, ABC News reported.
“The plea agreement makes very clear that he will not profit directly or indirectly nor will he help anyone else to profit from these crimes,” Durkan told KOMO, an ABC affiliate.
The federal case concerned the theft of firearms, planes, cars, a boat and more as Harris-Moore crossed the country. He was also sentenced to a concurrent seven-and-a-half-year state prison term, for a string of Washington burglaries.
Harris-Moore said he learned to fly from a manual and a computer simulator. However, his landing skills were lacking and all three planes crashed when he tried to bring them back down, the Seattle Times notes.
Hat tip: Daily Mail
