The Organizer Of The Fyre Festival Receives Long Prison Sentence

Billy McFarland, the guy who organized the Fyre Festival, just got six years in prison.

The sentence was handed down by a New York City judge on Thursday morning after McFarland pled guilty to two counts of wire fraud. 

The festival took place last year in the Bahamas. Attendees paid between $1,200 to $100,000 per ticket but weren't given proper accommodations and had to sleep in refugee tents or on the beach. Instead of the food they were promised, they were served cheese sandwiches. No musical acts ever appeared, and after about a day everyone had to be rescued from the island.

McFarland and Ja Rule, who promoted the festival, are also facing a $100 million class-action lawsuit.

“[Fyre Festival’s] lack of adequate food, water, shelter, and medical care created a dangerous and panicked situation among attendees — suddenly finding themselves stranded on a remote island without basic provisions — that was closer to ‘The Hunger Games’ or ‘Lord of the Flies’ than Coachella,” reads the class action complaint.

The Plaintiffs claim both men told their celebrity friends to stay away from the event, so they knew it would be bad, but they didn't tell the regular folks who bought tickets.

McFarland and Ja were also sued by the lending company EHL Funding for not paying back $3 million they borrowed. 

The feds had been looking into seeing if they could bring any charges against Ja, but so far nothing.