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SCOTUS Asked To Decide On Legal Fees In RIAA Cases
Fogerty's ghost notes that the Supreme Court has been asked to decide whether exonerated RIAA defendants should automatically be awarded attorneys' fees. Texas resident Cliff Thompson was sued by the RIAA, which subsequently dropped its copyright infringement lawsuit after it determined that his adult daughter was the culprit. Thompson was denied attorneys' fees by the district and appeals courts and is asking the Supreme Court to weigh in on the matter. "In the petition for certiorari filed with the Supreme Court, Thompson's attorney Ted Lee lays out the RIAA's legal strategy and notes what he describes as the 'inherent unfairness' of the lawsuits... The fight between the RIAA and alleged copyright infringers is inherently unbalanced due to the vast financial resources available to the record labels. The risk-reward ratio for defendants is seriously out of kilter, and mandating that a successful defense — even if it comes from the RIAA's decision to voluntarily dismiss a case — results in the record labels picking up the tab would even things out."
They sent out the invitations to the party, they get to foot the bill.
Laughter is the Spackle of the Soul.
Why isn't this the standard, anyway?
I can see why people argue that having the losing side shoulder all legal fees is a bad idea (even if I'm not sure I necessarily agree), but if somebody sues YOU and then just drops the case later on before there's actually any decision, why shouldn't they be required to reimburse you for the trouble they caused you for absolutely no reason at all? I'm not talking about millions in damages, but paying your lawyer fees and so on would be the least you'd expect.
Prediction: The real iPhone killer is going to be sex robots from Japan. Think about it.
Just "picking up the tab" is woefully inadequate. Defending oneself against RIAA action requires a tremendous amount of time, requires one to front a whole bunch of money to an attorney, and places a huge amount of stress on the person being sued. None of these apply the the RIAA -- their attorneys are being paid to do the lawsuits as their regular day-to-day jobs, the expense of the lawsuits is inconsequential and part of expected, budgeted business expenses for the RIAA, and the lawsuits impose no particular stress on the RIAA or its attorneys.
What needs to happen in these situations -- that is, when $BIG_COMPANY sues an individual and drops the suit or loses -- is that substantial punative damages need to be assessed to compensate the individual for lost time, their savings being used unexpectedly (what if they were planning to use that money for a new car or needed home repairs? What if they had to stop contributing to their retirement savings to pay their lawyer?), and for the stress of the lawsuit on the individual. Only with substantial punative damages will the RIAA have enough disincentive to file poorly-researched "shotgun"-style lawsuits.
I would think not paying a single red cent for something you didn't do would be quite the incentive. I must be frank, if you are right and you know it, you have a duty to fight. Rolling over because it's easy is both personally and socially irresponsible, and the fear of personal bankruptcy isn't one that would deter me. YMMV.
What I don't get is that the federal copyright statutes make explicit provisions for granting attorney's fees and court costs to the prevailing party, but it's still apparently like pulling teeth to get the courts to go along with it. If Congress didn't intend for people to actually be able to claim compensation when they win after suing/being sued, why did they put it in the statute?
If you do that, then nobody would DARE to sue IBM, MS, or whoever. MS pays their lawyers better than any other corporation in the industry. Imagine MS being able to run amoke, says that you can sue them, and of course, makes certain that your funds and lawyer's fund will give out LONG before they agree to anything. Now, you are stuck with their bill. If you are person, you just declare bankruptcy. If you are a business, MS owns you. No lawyer will take this on contigency.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Well, this isn't just loser pay. Hopefully it wouldn't be that broad.
But, when the RIAA has almost no evidence, sues someone, later realizes they don't have enough actual evidence, and drops the lawsuit
A full on "loser pays" system is a bad. Protecting the ability to accuse anyone and try to extort a settlement out of them so they don't go bankrupt defending themselves is also bad.
So far, the RIAA has been able to file papers, drop the claim, and walk away without any pushback. That's really awful.
Cheers
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Be careful what you ask for. The current system offers checks and balances.
This prevents me from suing, say Ford, when the Explorer tips over due to wheel or balance issues. Can you imagine how scary it would be (even if you are right) knowing that should you lose, your home is lost - you pretty much take the risk of bankruptcy to pay for the defendants lawyers.
Would you sue when your implants leaked? And what if I am rear-ended in a car accident and don't feel the settlement offered is enough. I sue for what my real losses are and am not awarded more. Did I just lose? The court agrees I get "some" money but not as much as I want. Who has lost? You pretty much prevent lawsuits from happening. Frivolous lawsuits already have potential penalties. You shouldn't be punished for a legitimate lawsuit.
The lawsuit in question in the article is clearly not legitimate. They sued the wrong person and should pay but to make fundamental changes to the legal system is not "a great idea".
While that sounds good, in this case the RIAA didn't even know if they were suing the right person. The case was dropped when it was shown that it was not this guy doing downloading, so that essentially he is having to pay court costs to prove he wasn't guilty. A good counter suit to the tune of 3 times his costs or more should help set the right precedent. If the **AA continues to sue people without being sure they are even suing the right people, their evidence is flawed horrendously. Sure, there is some purchase here for using the probable cause phrase, but in the end they were wrong and significantly distressed and inconvenienced this guy.
Without discovery (in this case a fishing trip) the RIAA cannot even be sure if there is anyone to sue. They don't have direct evidence of copyright infringement. They don't have anything more than circumstantial evidence in most cases.
IANAL but...
If Mr X has a gun that is the same kind as used to kill Mr Y, and Mr X was in the area of the murder at the time of the murder and had previously fought with Mr Y. The bullet was too damaged to do ballistics on it. That is circumstantial evidence. Pretty good but circumstantial
If Mr X has a gun that is the same kind as used to kill Mr Y, and Mr X was in the area of the murder at the time of the murder and had previously fought with Mr Y. The bullet ballistically matched Mr X's gun. Witnesses saw them together within minutes of the estimated time of death. That is strong evidence. This is what the RIAA does not have.
Taking Mr X to trial on circumstantial evidence has a matter of risk to it. They might not be able to convince a jury that Mr X killed Mr Y. He might have a good alibi. OR They may convict him only to find out 30 years later that Mrs Y killed him with the same kind of gun.
Basically, the RIAA uses bad evidence, circumstantial evidence, and other techniques to get convictions and runs away when they think they will lose. It's a shotgun approach. Sue everyone we can, let the complainers go free.
Right now the RIAA is telling artists that they represent that there is little to nothing left of all the money they got from Napster, so the RIAA can't really give them much of the rewards for that effort. It all went to lawyers.
Add all that up and the case against the RIAA looks bad for them. They are suing the wrong people, causing harm, ruining credibility, and their efforts are not even benefiting those they represent in court. I would not call that frivolous, I'd call it malicious.
How to bring that all together in court is a problem I'm not sure how to handle though. Clearly some retribution is called for against a bully that uses the legal system to bludgeon ordinary citizens with few resources into paying them 'protection' money.
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
As a law student who has had this debate at length in my Civil Procedure course I'm going to have to step up and chime in for the non-automatic payment of the losers fees. First there are routes of counter suits and counter claims if it's important and needed. But the main reason is that it will make the idea of profiteering law suits more dangerous just differently structured. It's just a numbers game. If you get a threatening letter stating a claim which could cost $2m to litigate and you have a 10% chance of losing you are theoretically on the hook for $200k - if they offer to settle for $100k more than most would settle. The rare few who didn't settle would be at the risk of the other side spending anything and everything to help them win. EVERYBODY would hire Johny Cochran et al to represent them and we would have far more trial circuses and fewer settlements an end the courts and legislature have already determined they don't like.
Basically the system sucks as it is now, but it could be worse and you need only imagine the situation where David gets sued by Goliath and has to pay Goliath's fees for losing.
This is patent law I'm talking about, prior art doesn't matter!
Prediction: The real iPhone killer is going to be sex robots from Japan. Think about it.
Let's not forget that this would widen the gap between the representation that the rich and the poor get even more. If I sue Tylenol because they filled my children's tylenol bottle with crack and wood alcohol, they can just throw 30 lawyers on the case and laugh their asses off. If they lose, their only additional cost would be my lawyer (likely a small percentage of the cost of settlement or their own lawyers); everything else would be the same as before attorney fees were regularly awarded. However, if I lost due to some technicality, I would have to pay for 31 lawyers in what was a legitimate case to begin with.