interference with copyright does not easily equate with theft, conversion, or fraud. The infringer of a copyright does not assume physical control over the copyright nor wholly deprive its owner of its use. Infringement implicates a more complex set of property interests than does run-of-the-mill theft, conversion, or fraud.
By the way, the infringer was acquitted, since the court agreed he hadn't "stolen, converted or taken by fraud", despite even making money from his infringing activities.
Unconvincing argument. The court's statement, as I reproduced above, is not about the specifics of the statute, otherwise it would have said "it's theft, just not physical removal". The wording is very clear.
The example of the other case (which, by the way, was only a District Court decision) also seems weak. AFAIK (IANAL), the fact that copyright law preempted state law doesn't mean the two are equal, it just means that both theft and copyright infringement occurred - which is easily seen to be the case, since physical plans were actually removed from a place.
Imagine there is a technology that could copy tangible goods such as cars. Now somebody makes a copy of your car. Your car was not stolen but you may not be happy with the fact that somebody now also has a copy of your personal belongings like a smartphone that was inside the car.
This is where copyright law comes into play which only allows copying the car only under your rules. If somebody doesn't follow the rules that doesn't mean they stole your car but it still means they should receive some form of punishment to prevent future copyright infringement.
