Slashdot Mirror
ElcomSoft Verdict: Not Guilty
truthsearch writes "From News.com: 'A jury on Tuesday found a Russian software company not guilty of criminal copyright charges for producing a program that can crack anti-piracy protections on electronic books.' HUGE legal win against the DMCA. Thank you Lawrence Lessig."
Read the article. Elcomsoft removed the software and claimed they didn't realize their software was illegal. They prosecution also could not find any illegal ebooks on the web that had been cracked by Elcomsoft's software. This doesn't mean they can start selling the software again. Nor does it mean the DMCA cannot be used in future cases. Essentially they could not provide that Elcomsoft willfully violated copyright, which is necessary in criminal copyright violation cases. This is not a "huge legal win" by any stretch of the word.
Nowhere. The judge actually had some sense and instructed the jury that, to find Elcomsoft guilty, they needed to decide that the company knowingly commited an illegal act, and intended to do so.
Secondly, there is NO proof of pirated eBooks out there, even after 2 independant groups were paid to troll the web looking for them. No proof of copyright violation, no DMCA-offense.
It really came down to whether or not there was a reasonable legal use for the tool or not. The jury found that there was, ie, fair use applications. Not guilty, case closed, proceed with appeals.
this always shakes me to my core. It is by far one of the scarier things about our legal system.
Example:
An aguantance of mine ("Tom") is a guidance counselor. Tom would not give a female student a late pass to class, even though she begged because she would get detention. He refused and she stormed off to class. When asked by her teacher why she was late she started crying hysterically. The teacher and her stepped outside and she explained that Tom had made her undress and begged her to have sex with him. He said he wouldn't let her go to class unless she did. (the story is bigger and longer but anyway).
Police are called in, Tom is suspended with pay (go unions) and told to get a lawyer (union said it would cover cost and then backed out).
The girl later confessed to the police that she made the whole thing up and she just didn't want detention and wanted Tom fired.
Get this, her mother said that the whole thing was too shady and that her daughter was too young to decide and she wanted to continue to press charges so that everything could be worked out in court!
Tom has now been asked to please find a job elsewhere (union prevents him from being fired outright), but this has been in the papers, so good luck. He had to sell his house to have money for the lawyer. And when all this is said and done, he will have no way to recover where he once was in life and career.
It makes me very, very ill.
Yeah, US suit laws (Tort?) are really messed up.
There are people who make a living suing other people. That's ALL THEY DO. They can file a suit for a pittance. Oftentimes, the defendant just settles. If not then the plaintiff goes to court and complains. Winning about half the time.
Bottom line: Win/Lose for the plaintiff and Lose/Lose for the defendant.
I also hear that in Europe, if the plaintiff in a suit loses, they foot the bill. I think it's high time the US adopted such a plan.
Codifex Maximus ~ In search of... a shorter sig.
So if a law is bad enough that it will be routinely dismissed in the lower courts, it will never get to the SC, and will never get overturned?? Only borderline bad laws get challenged constitutionally?
Sure, this is law, not logic, so it could well be like this. But I hope not.
Sure he does. It's called libel. In the civil courts he can sue the girl's family, the school district, the teacher the girl cryed to if she ran around telling everyone the story as fact, etc..