19-Year-Old Who Just Wanted to Spread the Gospel of Michael Bay May Go to Jail

We don’t quite recall how we spent our 19th birthday. Come to think of it, our 21st is a little fuzzy, too … but we digress. We’re fairly confident that Jhannet Sejas of Virginia will remember the day she turned the big 1-9. It started out with the simple plan of catching a midday movie, Michael Bay’s Transformers, with her boyfriend. Sejas loved the movie, so much so that she decided to record a twenty-second clip to get her younger brother psyched for a future viewing.

Bad move, apparently. Arlington police barged in a few minutes later and confiscated her camera. (As R. Kelly would say, Oh shit!) Sejas now faces up to a year behind bars and a fine of up to $2,500 for illegally recording a motion picture. “I was terrified,� she told the Washington Post. “I was crying. I’ve never been in trouble before.� Movie blog /Film is outraged and asking its readers to boycott the Regal Cinema, using the film-appropriate observation “We don’t live in a black and white world.�

Now we’re not saying what Jhannet Sejas did was right, but considering how many pirated DVDs come out all the time, we do feel sorry for a girl who might get jail time for twenty seconds of Transformers. And how on earth did she get caught? Oh, wait, it’s Regal. Someone narced. —Lori Fradkin

Out of the Theater, Into the Courtroom [WP]
Earlier: Movie-Theater Chain Introduces Wireless Complain-o-Matic