![]() Two Vulture journalists spent at least a year investigating, following a promising lead that proved to be nothing at all.īut none of the manuscripts he did get ever ended up on eBay, pirated, or otherwise revealed. ![]() Many people tried to Nancy Drew the case themselves, unsuccessfully. Industry professionals began using extra precautions when sharing manuscripts with (legit) colleagues, in some cases going to what seemed like really extreme lengths, including password protection for manuscripts no one had heard of and non-disclosure agreements people suspected one another and felt paranoid, changing passwords and sending out faked manuscripts to anyone they suspected might be the thief. In one case, an assistant realized the email had not come from their boss because it included the words “please” and “thank you.” In several cases described in the Vulture article, they only found out because they sent the manuscripts - or other replies - directly to the people they thought had asked for them, rather than replying to the email requests. And he very often got exactly what he requested, with many of the people he tricked realizing it only after the fact. He clearly knew publishing and publishing people and knew exactly what to ask for. He used email addresses that appeared to be legit, sent from domains that were extremely similar to the real thing and using the same font, email signature, and writing style as the person he was pretending to be. He pretended to be everyone from publicists to book scouts to agents. The short story is: a mystery person (now believed to be Bernardini) was posing as various publishing industry professionals and soliciting pre-publication manuscripts of assorted books, some of them high profile like The Man Who Chased His Shadow, the fifth installment in the Stieg Larsson/David Lagercrantz Millennium series of Lisbeth Salander books and some from debut authors who were not yet big names. (Here’s the same story in The Guardian, in case you, too, have reached your NYT article limit.) This is such a bizarre case, and the arrest answers the question of who, but not why. Twitter: All posts by Annika Barranti KleinĪ five-year mystery has been (mostly) solved, as the FBI arrested Italian citizen and UK publishing worker Filippo Bernardini yesterday on charges of impersonation and fraud. None of the stolen manuscripts seemed to appear online and the indictment does not mention whether he made any financial profit from the alleged theft.Annika Barranti Klein Contributing EditorĪnnika Barranti Klein likes books, obviously. One element of the story prosecutors hope to find out is what the accused's motivations might have been. In 2019, Atwood's agent revealed that the manuscript for “The Testaments” had been targeted.Ī New York Times investigation at the end of 2020 found that “Normal People” author Rooney, “Atonement” author McEwan, and actor Ethan Hawke had also been targeted. “The safekeeping of our authors' intellectual property is of primary importance to Simon & Schuster, and for all in the publishing industry, and we are grateful to the FBI for investigating these incidents and bringing charges against the alleged perpetrator,” it added.īernardini was released under “home detention” with a $300,000 bond secured on his home, a spokesperson for the Southern District of New York told AFP. “The employee has been suspended pending further information on the case,” the publisher said in a statement. “This real-life storyline now reads as a cautionary tale, with the plot twist of Bernardini facing federal criminal charges for his misdeeds,” he added in a statement.īernardini worked in London for Simon and Schuster, which said in a statement it was “shocked and horrified to learn of the allegations.” “Filippo Bernardini allegedly impersonated publishing industry individuals in order to have authors, including a Pulitzer prize winner, send him prepublication manuscripts for his own benefit,” said US prosecutor Damian Williams. He has been charged with wire fraud and identity theft, crimes punishable by 22 years in prison. The alleged scam had been known in literary circles for around five years with Margaret Atwood, Ian McEwan and Sally Rooney among writers reportedly targeted.īernardini was arraigned in court in Manhattan on Wednesday after being arrested by agents at JFK airport the day before. ![]() He is accused of impersonating literary agents and publishers over email to steal unpublished works from major authors. The FBI arrested Filippo Bernardini, a 29-year-old Italian employee of major publisher Simon & Schuster, in New York this week.
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