Slashdot Mirror
Racketeering Trial of MS and Best Buy Can Proceed
mcgrew (sm62704) writes with news that the Supreme Court has rejected an appeal by Microsoft and a unit of Best Buy to dismiss a lawsuit alleging violation of racketeering laws. This means the class-action complaint can go to trial. The case was filed in civil court and the companies, with the US Chamber of Commerce behind them, wanted the Supreme Court to put the brakes on the expanding use of RICO laws in civil filings. The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act was designed to fight organized crime, but in recent years more than 100 times as many civil as federal RICO cases have been filed.
The companies systematically and intentionally look for any advantage, and push the grey area as far as it can go, even into the dark side. Some of this may be "rogue" employees, but their are so many tiers of approval in major companies I find those theories suspect.
I tend to think that if the law fits...
On another note, I'm sure the RIAA was watching this one closely, as they are not looking forward to the RICO suit that was filed against them. Let's hope this is just another decision closer to the destruction of their methods.
The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act was designed to fight organized crime, but in recent years more than 100 times as many civil as federal RICO cases have been filed.
Well, if the feds can't be bothered to prosecute most things that they should... that's how the numbers end up, right?
Village idiot in some extremely smart villages.
A long time ago, prosecutors realized that organized crime tried to use legitimate business faces to sustain and grow itself. When various business interests, controlled by a common hand, unite to box their victim into an alley where they can be persuaded to "donate" their money to a cause also controlled by those same business interests, that's a serious threat to civilization. If each participant could only be prosecuted for disturbing the peace, the mugging would continue unchecked.
The real shame is that private citizens have to leverage civil courts for relief. If their are 100 times as many civil RICO actions as there are criminal RICO actions, it is most likely because prosecutors are not doing their jobs. A mugging is still a crime. Just because it is performed by people in suits doesn't make it less of a crime. And when the suit in the corporate office is orchestrating the systemic muggings of all their customers... it is a crime. An organized crime.
So even if we stick solely with your definition, the only difference in their behavior is the use of violence. If you replace the threat of physical violence with a threat of legal and financial ruin, they are virtually identical.
Use violence to coerce people? Organized crime!
Use lawyers to coerce people? Just shrewd business!
I think you watch too many movies, personally. The coercion part is what makes it "organized crime", not the means and methods.
=Smidge=
"Microsoft does not comment about pending litigation?"
This means Balmer's linux patent threats contain no litigation that is pending?
I live in a giant bucket.
Which, on the surface sounds like a "Beautiful Thing".
:-)
If you can't tell the difference between "a bunch of nicely dressed gentlemen of a certain ethnic persuasion"
doing X
and
legal, licensed, nicely dressed (albeit with bad brutally bad haircuts) officers of a public company
doing X
I think that finally affirmative action is working
It really shouldn't matter how bad your haircut is. A crook is a crook!
The truth about Led Zep should never be told on
The deal between MS and Best Buy was not illegal, unless giving the credit card numbers used to purchase computers at Best Buy to MS was part of it (and then only if not getting customer consent was part of the deal too). The suit is over Best Buy supposedly giving a customers credit card number to MS without informing/getting the customers permission. That is what is illegal. The fact of the deal is what makes the crime subject to RICO. I agree with the Chamber of Commerce that RICO has become overly broad in its application, although I'm not sure which side of the line this particular suit is. On the one hand, the RICO laws were clearly not intended to apply to cases like this (I remember the situations that led to the laws being passed, it had to do with efforts by big time drug dealers to turn drug money into legitimate businesses). On the other hand, without the threat of treble damages, the kind of profit that a big company can make off of most people's inertia is too much for most companies to resist.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
I am afraid you are very very wrong, and you should think a slashdot reader would know better. Copyright infringement is frequently called organized crime, people who make fake products are said to be organized crime, despite the fact that these "criminals" rarely if ever deal with violence.
The only qualifier for organized crime is in the words itself. Organized and crime. Yes the Rico act is meant to deal with more then just a handfull of bruglers and a fence who decide to operate together but make no mistake if you set up a group of people to commit a crime, you are organized and will be called as such by everyone in the legal proffesions except your lawyer.
Think about it like this. Blackmail, what really is the difference between forcing you to give me money through threathening your life or ruining your life to the point that you may commit suicide?
The idea that organized crime is just thugs who go around beating up people for money is just ridiculous. It really just is nothing more then criminals who organize.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.