Counterfeit perfume sends importer to jail

   A Chinese perfume importer on Monday was sentenced in Brooklyn, N.Y., to 12 months in prison for trafficking in counterfeit perfume, the U.S. Justice Department said.
   Shaoxiong Zhou, 42, of Shantou, Guangdong, China, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Sandra L. Townes in the Eastern District of New York. Townes also ordered Zhou to pay $20,000 in restitution.
   Zhou pleaded guilty Aug. 5 to one count of trafficking in counterfeit goods. He admitted that he offered to supply counterfeit perfume to prospective buyers at a Las Vegas trade show in August 2010. 
   He also admitted that he shipped a cargo container of counterfeit perfume to a facility in Staten Island, N.Y., in January 2011. That shipment, which was seized by Customs and Border Protection upon arrival in the United States, was found to contain about 37,000 units of perfume bearing counterfeit marks and made to resemble fragrance products from several well-known brands, including Lacoste, Polo Black and Armani Code.
   Zhou and codefendant Shaoxia Huang were arrested March 2 in Las Vegas and have been in custody since that time. Huang pleaded guilty Aug. 3 to one count of trafficking in counterfeit goods, and was sentenced on Dec. 7 to nine months in prison and was ordered to pay $20,000 in restitution.
   The case is part of a federal investigation of the import and distribution of counterfeit perfume and cosmetics products being conducted by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement – Homeland Security Investigations. The case is being prosecuted by Senior Counsel Jason Gull of the Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section in the Justice Department’s Criminal Division.