Domain: lacitybeat.com
Stories and comments across the archive that link to lacitybeat.com.
Comments · 6
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Re:Shouldn't they be asking ...
"I'm wondering if it would be possible to win some money by countersuing the RIAA for damages caused by these ridiculous lawsuits. I'm guessing this isn't really possible, otherwise, there'd be an army of greedy lawyers filing these lawsuits."
Possible, yes, likely, not so much.
What follows is not legal advice, unless I've cashed your check at $235/hr.
It's a lot easier to file a state civil RICO counterclaim than to win one.
I've only ever filed one,and never won one.
It tends to be done for tactical reasons, and judges tend to be sceptical.
But if you are backed by somebody with deep pockets, it's a fun way to turn the tables.
If somebody hits me or my client with a bogus lawsuit, I will always look for a valid reason to file a counterclaim. It can be ethical for me to file a counterclaim, in situations where I wouldn't have brought an original lawsuit.
In the RIAA situation, I suspect the way to go is to accuse the plaintiffs' lawyers of RICO.
Then commence discovery, and publish everything you find online in an open source counterattack.
This isn't feasible for the little guy; you need to find an angel like EFF or such.
The settlement center thinks your case is worth about $3500 to them.
By filing and litigating counterclaims, not against the plaintiff but against the lawyer,
you redefine the business model.
However, this has risks as well. Say you depose the lawyers to learn what houses they own and what cars they drive, and post this online, and some idiot happens to firebomb one of those houses while it is empty some weekend. You might then be accused of terrorism. Something like this happened to the Huntington 7 and Rob Coronado, as described in an article "Green Scare."
http://lacitybeat.com/article.php?id=5450&IssueNum =204
So don't rush out and start filing state RICO claims based on a slashdot article. If you know someone (or can find someone) who is hit with a filesharing suit, find a pro bono backer like a big law firm or a university legal clinic,and do a feasibility study of whether a little RICO claim makes sense.
I'm just an aardvark. I was once footnoted in Abrams' treatise on civil RICO,and I'm the guy who submitted the Microsoft/Best Buy RICO story that ran recently, but I don't know much about this stuff. -
Re:Quick question.
Here is your reference: Wisconsin Senator Robert W. Kasten Jr., Judge Jim Gray, Libertarian opponent to CA Sen. Barbara Boxer, Wyoming Senator Craig Thomas in a Senate statement, The Reason Magazine, and probably more.
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Yes, we do
In fact, we send them BACK to Congress more often than the Soviet politburo
Now that's an eye-opening stat. (and yes, I know its the LA City beat, but the numbers are verified on a ton of other sites/news services. And its a pretty easy fact to fact check) -
You're both wrong.
The whole "hand in horns" sign ISN'T a rock-and-roll thing, ISN'T about Satanism (although Xtian extremists simply love to blame everything on so-called "Satanic Forces", and quasi/pseudo-satanic (as opposed to the Church of Satan folks) types love to pillage anything and everything that's remotely metaphysical or occult-related as "their own" to make it "evil"-er. Even the cops tend to regurgitate the same stupidities spouted forth by the masss media.
The Mano Cornuta is an ancient occultic symbol that's commonly (although incorrectly) attributed to Italians. It's used to ward off "The Evil Eye", not to invoke 'Ol Split-Hoof. The "Why" and "How" of heavy-metal artist's starting to use an ancient occultic symbol should be self-evident as the industry (still) clings to half-truths and misconceptions of "evil-ness" as part of it's "charm" and "allure" to impressionable minds. -
In Riverside CountyThis incident in Riverside County, described in Paul Krugman's latest NYT column, is even scarier:
- It's election night, and early returns suggest trouble for the incumbent. Then, mysteriously, the vote count stops and observers from the challenger's campaign see employees of a voting-machine company, one wearing a badge that identifies him as a county official, typing instructions at computers with access to the vote-tabulating software.
When the count resumes, the incumbent pulls ahead. The challenger demands an investigation. But there are no ballots to recount, and election officials allied with the incumbent refuse to release data that could shed light on whether there was tampering with the electronic records.
This isn't a paranoid fantasy. It's a true account of a recent election in Riverside County, Calif., reported by Andrew Gumbel of the British newspaper The Independent.
- It's election night, and early returns suggest trouble for the incumbent. Then, mysteriously, the vote count stops and observers from the challenger's campaign see employees of a voting-machine company, one wearing a badge that identifies him as a county official, typing instructions at computers with access to the vote-tabulating software.
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Another exampleAlso see this article, the subject of a Metafilter discussion today:
At around 8:50, Soubirous's campaign manager, Brian Floyd, received a call from an election observer in Temecula informing him that the vote count had been stopped - apparently by Registrar Mischelle Townsend herself. The reason was not made clear. So Floyd and another Soubirous campaigner named Art Cassel jumped into a car and drove to Townsend's office to investigate. Sure enough, the counting area appeared to be near-deserted. But then they noticed two men huddled at one of the vote tabulation computers.