Two owners of a computer maintenance company with offices in Dublin face up to five years in prison for cheating Oracle Corp. out of $1.2 million for software “patches.”

The two men were among four executives of TERiX Computer Co. who pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Columbus. Based in Sunnyvale, California, TERiX has a “substantial” operation in Dublin, according to prosecutors.

Bernd D. Appleby, 65, of San Jose, California, chief executive officer and 70 percent owner of TERiX, and James A. Olding, 51, of Dublin, the chief operating officer who owns 30 percent, were the most culpable, prosecutors said.

Lawrence E. Quinn Jr., 58, of Hilliard, executive vice president for sales, faces six months on house arrest. Jason T. Joyce, 47, of Dublin, director of technical services, faces two years on probation.

U.S. Magistrate Norah McCann King presided at separate hearings for each man and recommended that District Judge James L. Graham accept the guilty pleas. Graham would then sentence the defendants. No date has been set.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Jessica Kim said the four men conspired to cheat Sun Microsystems, and then Oracle, after the two companies merged in January 2010.

Third-party maintenance companies like TERiX are supposed to download patches from Oracle’s support website and pay a fee for each client’s computers or servers that needs a software fix or upgrade. Instead, the defendants conspired to use a patch for thousands of computers and servers.

Oracle discovered what TERiX was doing and ordered it to stop, Kim said. The defendants continued the scheme by downloading patches from Oracle through two affiliated companies and a third fictitious company.


The defendants used internal code names such as Boeing, James Bond and Plan E to hide the conspiracy from other TERiX employees. They used prepaid cellphones, aliases, fictitious addresses and an Internet service that could not be traced back to TERiX.

However, someone at TERiX slipped up and Oracle saw an IP address connected to TERiX, Kim said.

Between Dec. 9, 2010, and March 20, 2014, TERiX downloaded “intellectual property” such as the patches from Oracle more than 2,700 times. TERiX then used them for 500 of its national and international customers, Kim said.

Oracle sued and a 2015 a settlement agreement required TERiX to pay Oracle more than $57 million. Since then, however, the amount has been whittled down to $1.2 million, which TERiX still has not paid, Kim said.

That amount could be the restitution paid, along with the forfeiture of any property acquired with profits of the conspiracy.

Well, to be fair, it's ridiculous to have to pay for software patches. That should be included in the original license.