Twenty-nine year old Fillipo Bernardini was a low level employee at Simon and Schuster UK when he was found to be the thief who stole over 160 manuscripts from authors between August of 2016 to July of 2021. Writers and celebrities like Margaret Atwood, Sally Rooney, Ian McEwan, and Ethan Hawke were targeted by the thief. The severity of such a crime is more serious than anticipated, as Bernardini was being hunted down by the FBI, who accused him of having “impersonated, defrauded, and attempted to defraud, hundreds of individuals”. Ultimately, Bernardini was charged with wire fraud, as well as aggravated identity theft. A charge of wire fraud will cost a person of a maximum of 20 years imprisonment, while aggravated identity theft calls for two consecutive years of imprisonment.
It would make sense that the culprit, who is also known as the ‘spine collector’, was someone who worked within the world of publishing, as through his communication with authors, he was well versed in the language used when it came to writing and publishing.
When it came to the actual stealing of manuscripts, it was all digital. Bernardini would create fake emails and web pages, where he would very similarly type out the names, switching out ‘m’s for ‘rn’, ‘g’s for ‘q’s, and using ‘t’ for ‘f’. The web pages created would require the person to sign in, and later send this information to Bernardini’s email. As for his personal digital paper trail, Bernardini had been very careful. On his personal and professional platforms, such as LinkedIn, he did not state his full name.
The motivation for his actions were unclear. Some speculated that he was hoping to gain rights for movies and shows that would be based on these books. Other speculations included that he would take these ideas and play them off as his own, or possibly use these manuscripts to boost his translation career. Literary scout, Kelly Farber, stated that the material he possessed “is basically a huge amount of information that any publisher anywhere would be able to use to their advantage.” Oddities within the case specifically were the lack of ransom requests once the text was stolen, as well as the text not being uploaded onto the dark web.
Bernardini arrived at JFK airport on January 5th and was arrested by the FBI. His bail was set to 300,000 dollars, which his father paid. Bernardini was required to surrender his passport, as he was deemed to be a flight risk.
citations:
- https://www.npr.org/2022/01/06/1070900490/fbi-hoax-book-manuscripts#:~:text=Federal%20authorities%20says%20Bernardini%20impersonated,July%202021%2C%20according%20to%20prosecutors.
- https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/05/books/publishing-manuscripts-phishing-scam-filippo-bernardini.html#:~:text=F.B.I.-,Arrests%20Man%20Accused%20of%20Stealing%20Unpublished%20Book%20Manuscripts,over%20five%20or%20more%20years.
- https://newrepublic.com/article/165234/filippo-bernardini-literary-publishing-scammer
- https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10378263/Simon-Schuster-employee-pleads-not-guilty-stealing-manuscripts.html
