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RIAA Accepts $300 Offer of Judgement In Carolina
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "In a North Carolina case, Capitol v. Frye, the RIAA has accepted a $300 offer of judgment made by the defendant. This is the first known use, in the RIAA v. Consumer cases, of the formal offer of judgment procedure which provides that if the plaintiff doesn't accept the offer, and doesn't later get a judgment for a larger amount, the plaintiff is responsible for all of the court costs from that point on in the case. The accepted judgment in the Frye case (PDF) also contains an injunction — much more limited than the RIAA's typical 'settlement' injunction (PDF) — under which defendant agreed not to infringe plaintiffs' copyrights."
Get thee to Wikipedia!
/d?/ was seen as an incorrect spelling. In the context of the law, however, judgment is preferred."
"The spelling judgment is found in the Authorized Version of the Bible. However, the spelling judgement (with e added) largely replaced judgment in the United Kingdom in a non-legal context, possibly because writing dg without a following e for the
Someone's getting sued by the RIAA. He said to the RIAA, "look, buddy, I'll give you $300 to go away, and if you wont take it and you can take me to court instead. However, bear in mind that there are two ways things could go from there: the court could say I owe you more than $300, or they could say I don't. If for any reason they say I don't, you have to pay for my lawyer."
The RIAA crunched the numbers and decided to take the $300.
Let's say Joe sues you for $10,000 for your kids trampling his rose bush.
You think Joe is full of shit, that his mangy rose bush is only worth $100. So you offer to pay him $100 to end the lawsuit.
If Joe accepts, that is the end of it.
If Joe turns you down, then he will have to pay all of your costs (and is some states, attorney fees) from that moment on if when the case goes to trial, he does not win MORE than the $100 you offered.
The basic reasoning is that if someone who injured you offers to pay you what your claim is worth, you should take it. If you don't accept the offer, you should have to pay him for the trouble you cause to HIM by not taking his reasonable offer.
If Joe wins MORE than the $100 you offered, he is in the clear.
It makes people examine exactly what the claim is worth, and gives both sides incentive to offer (and accept) a reasonable offer.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
Not really. First off, you don't plead guilty in civil cases such as this. Second, courts have held (see, e.g., Scosche v. Visor Gear) that Rule 68 judgments do not have a preclusive effect on litigating issues they dispose of. Therefore, the RIAA probably cannot take the Rule 68-based judgment and use it against this defendant in a future case to avoid actually litigating the issues in the future case. Numerous sources indicate that Rule 68 has the sole purpose of encouraging settlement.
Finally, the real issue that was raised and to which I responded: There is no precedential effect, no matter how you take the Rule 68-based judgment. Legal precedents are only as to issues of law. It seems that no interpretation of law was made here, and any issues that were disposed of by the judgment are factual in nature. There is no such thing as a legally binding factual precedent.
WTF are you talking about? It makes perfect sense.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
I dare you to try to recover more than that.
If you don't recover more than that, you're going to be liable for all of the court costs from this day forward.
If you've got the guts, bring it on.
If you don't, pick up the $300 and get out of my life.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
But there are consequences if the RIAA accepts the offer. There is a judgment against you, which shows up in a credit report, and in view of the judgment you can't claim to be the prevailing party and assert entitlement to attorneys fees.
But for many the Rule 68 offer of judgment will be a useful tool.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful