St. Mark's Kim's Raided

After reports of a raid, it turns out that employees at the Mondo Kim's on St. Mark's were arrested for making illegal CDs and DVDs in a back room. The police took "hundreds" of illegally made discs during the afternoon raid, and charging five workers with trademark counterfeiting. The NY Post says that some "record-industry executives joined cops outside the store and helped point out what police said were the 'mixes of a variety of hip-hop songs and compilations the employees were selling.'" Hear that? If you're a record store employee, do not make any mix tapes...especially not at work. And Gothamist thought we were being "bad" by buying DVDs and CDs before their official release date at Kim's.

Gothamist on the closing of the "mean" Kim's location.

Contact the author of this article or email tips@gothamist.com with further questions, comments or tips.

By Jen Chung in News on June 10, 2005 9:38 AM

Comments [rss]

andrew simmons

That movie "Apocalypse Oz" got nabbed too apparently. What the hell do they have a problem with that for?

Sans Cankles

Same comment applies here...I'm glad my tax dollars are going for booking dangerous Mondo Kim's employees instead of staffing MTA booths to prevent subway rapings.

EightBitHustler

Screw the RIAA.. this is exactly the reason I will continue to "steal" their lame ass shit.. they can stick thier heavy hands up their collective arses.

bob denver

Kim's provides a public service. Many of their bootlegs are unreleased things of cultural significance. The place is a goldmine. If it closes a lot of stuff will be lost and unavailable elsewhere. Score one for homogenized entertainment.

Jack

Gothamist, I doubt the bust was made because of them releasing official DVDs before the official release date. Those are legit DVDs and while not ideal, they were still legit DVDs. Nobody was being ripped off.

But I'm echoing keith's sentiments. Wonder what caused the raid to happen now rather than YEARS AGO when this stuff was going on in the past. The amount of bootleg DVDs in that place was absolutely shocking. It was amazing to me I could be on line in the store in the middle of the day and watch a guy blatantly create DVDs--with shrink-wrap and everything--right behind the counter.

And for what it's worth, everyone in this city knows that even before Kim's sold DVDs the shelves were ALWAYS stocked to the brim with bootleg VHS tapes.

I really want to know how they avoided getting raided in the past.

greg.org

I wouldn't be surprised if it was the RIAA hack in a "COPS" windbreaker that the Post is talking about.

In MTV.com's report of the bust, they mention that 50 Cent songs were included on the mixtapes, which is hi-lariously hy-pocritical, since 50c got his start selling mixtapes on the street.

keith

I'm a long time Kim's shopper, but frankly, I'm surprised it took this long. It sometimes looks like half their DVD stock is bootleg.

bob denver

Yeah, who are these weasel record executives teaming up with the cops. As far as I'm concerned kim's video is the most important cultural institution in nyc - more so than MOMA or lincoln center. Hope Mr. Kim stays afloat.

bb

As far as I understand, the mix-tapes in question were not "made" by the Kim's staff. There is a large underground network producing these things. Kim's happens to be one of the places they might be found.

Interesting that the times makes no mention of record execs being present. Shouldn't the NYPD, feds, whoever be doing there own homework rather than bringing execs to a "crime scene"?