On the 16th, the Osaka Prefectural Police Department Suita Office filed charges against a 50-year-old man from Minoo, Osaka for filming the anime feature Detective Conan: The Scarlet Bullet with his smartphone, thus violating Japan’s Copyright Law and the Act on Prevention of Unauthorized Recording of Films.

Theatergoers noticed that a man was with a smartphone on his lap in a Suita theater. Suspecting that he was recording the movie, the spectator called the police on April 24.

MBS News reports that the suspect works at the tax office in Ashiya, Hyogo Prefecture, which is one of the most expensive and exclusive areas in the Kansai region.

Even though the 50-year-old intended only to record the film before the current COVID-19 state of emergency started on April 25th, and did not have any intention to distribute the movie, he was charged with violating the Japanese Copyright Act.

This incident has made national news in Japan which isn’t very surprising as copyright violations are a serious offense in the country, and that applies to those who are breaking these laws without the intent to distribute.

Detective Conan: The Scarlet Bullet is the 24th film in the franchise. The film sold 1,533,054 tickets and earned 2,218,130,800 yen (about US$20.5 million) in its first three days to rank #1 in the Japanese box office in its opening weekend. The film has earned a cumulative total of 6,777,862,250 yen (about US$61.98 million). The film has sold over 4.83 million tickets.

Source: Kotaku