A former student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison says an addiction to videogames drove him to embezzle over $12,000 from his fraternity.
Jose R. Tavarez, the former treasurer of the Delta Theta Sigma fraternity, used a frat debit card to ring up roughly $12,280 in about 70 purchases from “game-oriented businesses” along with numerous others from online dealers selling computer equipment. He blamed the spree on his videogame addiction, telling police he used the fraternity money because his bank account is linked to his parents’ and he didn’t want them knowing that he was spending money on games.
Tavarez has been charged with one count of theft in a business setting and four counts of modifying computer data, not only to cover the theft but also to avoid having to pay rent to the fraternity.
The whole case is mystifying but here’s the question I’m hung up on: What did this guy really buy? If Tavarez is so desperate to play videogames and he’s smart enough to be the treasurer of a university fraternity, then wouldn’t he be smart enough to figure out how to pirate games on P2P sites? You can’t torrent a console I suppose, but how much hardware does one guy need? A PlayStation 3, an Xbox 360 and a Wii will run you maybe $1000; say another two grand for a killer PC. What else is there? I hope we find out exactly what it was Tavarez so desperately needed so we can see just how much his “videogame addiction” had to do with it.
Source: Wisconsin State Journal, via GamePolitics
