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Judge Rules That IBM Did Not Destroy Evidence
UnknowingFool writes "From the latest in the SCO saga, Judge Wells ruled today that IBM did not destroy evidence as SCO claims. During discovery, SCO claims it found an IBM executive memo that ordered its programmers to delete source code, and so it filed a motion to prevent IBM from destroying more evidence. The actuality of the memo was less nefarious. An IBM executive wanted to ensure that the Linux developers were sandboxed from AIX/Dynix. So he ordered them to remove local copies of any AIX code from their workstations so that there would not be a hint of taint. The source code still existed in CVMC and was not touched. Since the source code was still in CMVC, Judge Wells ruled IBM did not destroy it. Incredulously, SCO's Mark James requested that IBM tell SCO how to obtain the information. IBM's Todd Shaughnessy responded that all during discovery (when IBM gave SCO a server with their CMVC database) SCO never once said that they were unable to find that information from CMVC. Judge Wells asked IBM to help SCO out in any way he could."
Pwned!
Could anything happen at this point that even might help SCO? I really hope we get to move to the summary executions^Hjudgment phase here pretty soon...
But this is slashdot. A slashdoter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber!
This is great news for Linux, but is there even an end in sight for this case? I know if its not done right it could unleash years of appeals as well. Any Lawyers in the house have any idea when this case will wrap up?
... Which way did they come in?
SCO had the memo that said the code was on the CMVC server. They were handed the CMVC server, and apparantly never looked or verified the contents of the memo before claiming it as evidence of deleted code. SCO was trying to pass yet another one over on the Judge, this is painfully idiotic.
Under the influence of Post-Cyberpunk Gonzo Journalism
I think Judge Wells sees what is going on and is giving SCO pretty much whatever they want, just to make sure they've got no grounds to appeal when he slaps them down (hopefully soon). Giving them all the rope they want to hang themselves with, as it were. Let's hope it works.
Fill in your four or five-letter word of wisdom here _ _ _ _ _.
From the latest in the SCO saga, Judge Wells ruled today that IBM did not destroy evidence as SCO claims.
So when can we expect the SEC investigation of SCO misconduct? I mean, they're all over Apple over some minor options backdating, the least they could do is deal with the huge pump-and-dump fraud going on in plain sight.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
"Please describe the scientific nature of the 'whammy'" - Agent Scully
Mark James was certainly not incredulous. Judge Wells probably was. Anyone who reads about it, probably is.
Incredible: hard to believe. Incredulous: a person who finds something hard to believe.
I know I shouldn't be harping on about these kinds of things, but it's a common error and maybe someone will learn something.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
SCO will soon be bankrupt. That moves out Darl and co. and moves in the bankruptcy trustee. The trustee will not spend a penny more on litigation. The trustee and the creditors (Novell and IBM) will agree on terms and all the issues will be settled pretty much to IBM/Novell's satisfaction.
The issues probably can't raise their head ever again, no matter who is found to own the Unix copyrights. In particular, Novell is forestalled from raising them because it has argued against them in court and there's a rule about not saying contradictory things in two different courts. So, when it's over, it's over.
SCO didn't fabricate evidence. If they did, they'd have some...
Unfortunately the lawyers are now running SCO "till death do us part".
It would be far better for everyone if the judge just gave a summary judgement to IBM and told SCO to just commit suicide and be done with it.
So I can download Linux legally.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
There's the BIG reel of rope, hung from a pipe. Judge Wells is holding up one end of the pipe and IBM's legal team is holding up the other.
The trial isn't over yet solely because there's still some rope left on the reel. The judge and IBM want SCO to unreel it all. That way, when SCO goes to the appeal judge(s) and claims they didn't let SCO unreel it all and see if it was all the same color, they can hold up the empty reel. Then the appeals judge(s) can laugh them out of the courtroom, rather than winding all the rope back on the reel and sending them back to Judge Wells' court to do it over. B-)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
OK, law school teaches that there are two sides to everything and that you should be able to switch to arguing the other side before the professor calls on the next student. There wouldn't be trials if the facts were obvious, you have to hear both sides in detail, etc.
That said, there is a difference between vigorous advocacy and pig-headed dishonesty.
The question for professionals out there is, what does an attorney or a firm need to do in order to get sanctioned?
A followup question would be, if any of us ever winds up in court, can the attorney(s) on the other side get away with acting like the ones for SCO have?
Of course I realize that the answer is "it depends". What does it depend on, and where do typical judges draw the line?
So when can we expect the SEC investigation of SCO misconduct?
SCO's crap, while it's obvious to us that it's a shakedown-gone-wrong turned pump-n-dump scheme, proving that is another matter. Put another way - what would the SEC hit them *for*, and what would the proof be? And could they prove fraud as opposed to incompetence?
While SCO has plausible deniability for the claims in court, SCO executives mad a lot of public statements (such as about finding numbers of lines of infringing code) that would tend to inflate their stock price, were demonstrably false, that that the SCO executives in question either knew were false, or should have known, had they done their due diligence before uttering them. There ought to be plenty of meat there.
I'd expect that the SEC and the shareholders are holding off pending the resolution of the suit. After that, if there's anything worth going after and/or anyone left standing on the SCO side, you might see some action.
Some SCO executives ended up with money in their pockets. Some shareholders ended up losing bundles. Don't be surprised if, once SCO v. IBM is over there's another one, leveling anything left of SCO and turning the execs into imprisoned paupers.
Meanwhile, if the banking regulators are on the ball, they'll be watching the assets of the people in question, to see if they start moving into out-of-country money-cleaning-and-storage operations. B-)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
"Judge Wells asked IBM to help SCO out in any way he could."
Maybe this is why I'll never go to law school, but I'd probably respond to that at that point by placing a loaded gun on the table and tell them "Kill yourself. Now."
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