Slashdot Mirror
RIAA Drops Case, Should Have Sued Someone Else
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "Once again the RIAA has dropped a case with prejudice, this time after concluding
it was the defendant's daughter it should have sued
in the first place. In the case of Lava v. Amurao, mindful that in similar scenarios it has been held liable for the
defendant's attorney fees (Capitol v. Foster and Atlantic v. Andersen), the RIAA went on the offensive. In this case there was actually no attorney fee motion pending, making their motion all the more intriguing. The organization argued that it was the defendant's
fault that the record companies sued the wrong person, because the defendant didn't tell them that his daughter was the file sharer they were looking for."
The 5th Amendment only protects you from SELF-incrimination. You still can be charged as an accessory or with obstruction of justice or other such charges if you know the perpetrator of a crime and fail to report it, particularly if the police are actively speaking to you on the matter; it's perjury if you actively lie.
That said, the RIAA is a bunch of douchebags, and I hope EMI pulls their funding. That should start a cascade of flagging support that ends in the destruction of that ridiculous cabal.
except, it's a civil-case, not a criminal case.
I hope EMI isn't the only one that pulls their funding.
And that Congress declares the RIAA as racketeering bunch of a-holes....(under RICO).
if you don't like it, go here and change your settings for what appears on the front page.
upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
One has already been filed, I think:
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/08/17/1728225
How successful it's going to be, well...that remains to be seen.
"I was under the impression that the burden of proof lies with the plaintiff." That's OK, lots of people don't know the difference between civil and criminal cases.
Uh, not quite. The standard of proof is lower. In a criminal case the standard is 'Beyond a Resonable Doubt'. With civil, it is 'Preponderance of Evidence'. This means that if it is more likely that the defendant committed an infraction than not, then they are found in judgment.
This is an important advantage to the plaintiff, in this case the RIAA, because they don't have to have rock solid proof to convince the judge/jury of wrong doing. This is why OJ Simpson was not convicted in his criminal trial, yet was so in his civil trial.
We're all hypocrites. We all have hidden parts, it's the contrast between them that make us more a hypocrite than others
Kipling also described it nicely here.
Strike while the irony is hot! -- The Freethinker
Nope. Wrong.