zlacker

Stealing a car deprives the previous owner of the car of possession and use. It is a criminal charge and you will be punished for it regardless of the monetary value of the car. The owner of the car could also sue the thief for financial damages caused by not having the car for a month, which won't be more than the cost of an equivalent rental for a month, so it's not even worth bothering.

Copyright infringement does not deprive the copyright owner of its property and is not criminal. So in this case only the lawsuit part applies. The owner is only entitled to the monetary damages, which is the lost sale. But in this case the sale price was paid to the owner 1 month later, so the only real damages will be the interest the publisher could have earned if they had got their money one month earlier.

>>fallin+(OP)
Your take on how copyright infringement works only counts for unregistered copyrights. If the copyrighted works are registered with the copyright office statutory damages apply:

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/504