Former MPAA Exec Sentenced to 12 Months in Prison on Sexual Abuse and Blackmail Charges

The former general counsel for the Motion Picture Association on Friday was sentenced to 12 months in prison for sexually abusing and blackmailing a woman he met through a dating site.

Steven Fabrizio was fired by the MPAA in August 2019 shortly after being arrested. On July 30, 2021 he pleaded guilty to blackmail and third-degree sexual abuse charges. D.C. Judge Marisa J. Demeo sentenced him to 30 months of incarceration — however, all but 12 months of the sentence will be suspended if he successfully completes three years of supervised probation. Fabrizio will also have to register as a sex offender for the 10 years following his release, according to a joint press release from U.S. Attorney Matthew M. Graves Metropolitan Police Department chief Robert J. Contee III.

According to that press release, Fabrizio and the woman “had consensual sex, and Fabrizio gave her $400 in cash, as agreed upon beforehand.” Afterward, he tried to set up another meeting but she declined. Then Fabrizio sent “a series of texts to her, warning that the woman’s employer, parents, and landlord would be told about their sex-for-cash arrangement unless she continued to submit to his demands for further sexual encounters.” During a second encounter, Fabrizio sexually abused her and she contacted the MPD after receiving further harassing texts.

At the time of Fabrizio’s arrest, an MPAA source said it had no prior knowledge of the behavior and described it as “shocking and intolerable to the Association.”