Judge Deals Blow to RIAA

jcgam69 writes "A federal judge in New Mexico has put the brakes on the RIAA's lawsuit train, at least in the US District Court for New Mexico. The case in question is part of the RIAA's campaign against file-sharing on college campuses and names "Does 1-16," who allegedly engaged in copyright infringement using the University of New Mexico's network. In a ruling issued last month but disclosed today by file-sharing attorney Ray Beckerman, Judge Lorenzo F. Garcia denied the RIAA's motion to engage in discovery. This means that the RIAA will not be able to easily get subpoenas to obtain identifying information from the University."

Comments

Curious phrasing

[TubeSteak]

In a ruling issued last month but disclosed today

What they really mean is that:
1. nobody attended the court to hear the motion being ruled upon
2. nobody read the court filings after the ruling
3. nobody bothered to get a transcript of the trial to see what happened.

In other words, the trial wasn't all that important to [news organizations].
And why wait a month to 'disclose' the ruling?

Re:Witch hunts last until they're unprofitable.

[Ungrounded Lightning]

A serf is an indentured labourer who works on the land of the lord (not lord god, lord farthingsworth etc), I cant remember the term but you probably meant freeholder or something like that

Actually they went after both.

Serfs often had other assets: houses, tools, money, jewelry. Also, serfs weren't just interchangeable workers, ala migrant farmhands. Serfdom was a two-way obligation. Serfs typically (depending on country's rules, of course) had an inherited right to farm a PARTICULAR chunk of land for a cut of the profits.

If the serf (or his ancestors) had put in a lot of work on the land (like by putting in deep wells, constructing good buildings, treating the soil right, etc.) he would improve its value, both to the lord and to himself. The serf could become very well-to-do if his land produced lots of crops, the plants were hardier and resisted plant diseases, his wells didn't run dry while everybody else's did, his animals survived bad weather, etc.

Of course when there was a bad year and everybody else's wells ran dry or crops failed and mistreated, starved, and overcrowded animals got sick, while Mr Hardworking Serf's crops, livestock, and wells did just hunky-dory, it could easily be used to start rumors of witchcraft.

Once the pesky serf was eliminated, not only were his liquid assets divied up, but the Lord was free of his obligation to let the serf continue farming this particularly good hunk of land. The lord could then add it to his personal estate, farm it with his household staff and get ALL the profits, make a new serfdom arrangement on better-for-the-lord terms with another family, etc.

Re:6th Amendment

[NewYorkCountryLawyer]

The article mentions a New York judge that ruled the opposite way in a similar case. Pardon my ignorance, but can anyone explain exactly how it's deemed even mildly legal for the RIAA to file suits against individuals and have motions against them when they're not allowed to face their accuser due to secrecy? This seems like an open and shut case to me. I agree. I can't for the life of me imagine why any judge in the United States ever signed an ex parte RIAA discovery order. It's completely contrary to well settled legal principles for them to have done so.

They don't just do normal John Doe suits.

[Xenographic]

It's not just that they file a John Doe suit, it's that they join dozens or even hundreds of unrelated parties into a single lawsuit. The one and only basis for that is that all the Does in that lawsuit share the same ISP, which is not, to my non-lawyerly knowledge, a permissible reason for joining parties according to the FRCP. One Texas judge ordered them to put a stop to that very practice of "defrauding" the state of its rightful filing fees, yet the practice continues in other venues.

Also, even once they have someone's identity, they've been known to play tricks with John Doe suits. I believe that, in the case of Mr. Merchant, he retained a lawyer and they offered to make his hard drive available, but only to outside counsel. The RIAA withdrew that lawsuit before they filed an answer in court (you can do that, it's a free pass to get out of court) and filed another John Doe suit in an attempt to get his hard drive directly, where they could have in-house people fish through it at will. By virtue of that being a John Doe suit, they meant to keep his lawyer out of the courtroom, preventing the counsel they knew he had from responding to their dirty tactics.

Basically, what I'm trying to say is that although John Doe suits are perfectly normal, the way the RIAA uses them is not. They use pretty much any trick they think they can get away with, however dirty, even if it's contrary to the law. And when they pull these tricks, they try to make sure that no one is able to object.

To be honest, it tempts *me* to do things that I sincerely doubt are well supported by any laws at all. For example, can you file amicus briefs in random John Doe suits pointing out that Texas case? I have no idea, and incredibly dubious, but it might be worth the price of a stamp, especially because I could ask that the judge give those facts judicial notice even if the amicus itself was thrown in the trash... The other trick might be doing so anonymously. Can you even file an amicus anonymously? I haven't the foggiest. But I'm pretty sure I could just not sign my name. And I'm also pretty sure I could sign it "John Doe" out of an abundant sense of irony :-) For all I know, I'll end up being one of the Does by mistake someday (I don't listen to or like their crappy music, why on earth would I waste HD space on it?). I'd like to say that might even make them waste a little money responding or objecting to it, but I bet they'd make a form letter brief to reply to them if anyone made a habit of it...

Of course, these things being done ex parte also makes it pretty hard for me to find out about them before they're over...