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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."
Any /. lawyers care to explain why the defendants would be unable to collect for legal fees on these lawsuits? I'm not terribly versed in how this legal stuff works, but I was of the understanding that in any case, if I am wrongfully taken to court, I am allowed to counter-sue for legal fees. I thought that was part of the balance that kept people from suing just for fun with no repercussion.
What is the difference with these lawsuits the RIAA is bringing?
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This might set precident if SCOTUS rules in favor of it for the US going to a loser pays court system which I think would be a great idea.
However, this issue has nothing particular in common with the RIAA itself. Slashdot readers should know that within US legal system (common law, precedents, etc..) simply there's much different way of arguing things before the court. Almost everythig must be brought before the court. Within so called "continental law" (civil law, etc..) in most of the morld reimbursing attorney fees to the winning side of the case is a rule rather then an exception that has to be argued specially.
It's easy to see why an entity like RIAA should be forced to pay legal fees if it loses or drops its case, but making that award automatic would be even worse in the long run.
If a person sues a chemical company for polluting a lake, and the company gets off, it will wreck the person who tried to sue. A few million is corporate discovery costs and lawyers it too much to risk.
I think the relative difference in resources between the litigating entities should be considered. In the "david vs goliath" scenario, david should never be made to pay and goliath should be made to pay upon loss. That is hard to codify into law.
The only lawsuits filed would occur when the party pressing charges is sure they have a case and a significant enough chance of winning to risk it.
But, but, but... THAT'S UNAMURICAN! If I want to sue my neighbor for planting a tree that blocks my view of the sunrise, then I have that right, standing be damned.
There is a flip-side to this.. If I have a reasonable case (such as treating my personal information with all the due care given to a week old bag of garbage) and I sue a retailer (such as a large retailer based in Framingham MA) that exposed it (through weak wifi encryption), they could then snow me under with requests, subpoenas, depositions, etc. If I didn't have the financial resources to keep up my side of the case, I would have to drop it and suffer the double loss of having to pay for the privilege of getting boned in court.
Deciding to award attorney fees belongs solely in the hands of the court that is hearing the case. If you don't like it, appeal.
The truth about Scientology, Xenu, and you: Operation Clambake
So, currently, it's a very effective extortion racket.
You are being MICROattacked, from various angles, in a SOFT manner.
How so? I consider the protection of my reputation to be worth something. I also consider my personal freedom to be worth something. If I have the money, there's nothing "fiscally irresponsible" about using it for something I consider important.
If you were told that with 20k you could protect a large portion of the population from future abuse, would you do it? I have ot think, based on your post, you would rather pay 2k to protect yourself instead. Am I wrong?
I live in Canada, and we have a loser-pays system. I recently moved into a house where there were lots of "hidden" issues, that - unfortunately - went beyond your standard home pre-inspection. Among them, a dryer which had a loose vent (and was venting superheated air into a nice pile of dry lint) - that you couldn't see without rearranging half the laundry room, a range-hood that had the exit-vent sealed up, and a fuse-box in which hidden under 4 of 6 fuses were nicely scorched pennies. An inspector will go over obvious things, but he generally won't pull fuses or otherwise rearrange major appliances as it can seriously disrupt the home for the current occupants.
I'm not so much pissed about the cost of repairs as the potential that these had for *killing* me, especially the fuse issue (in having the power turned off and pulling the pennies, several fuses were badly scorched on the inside, the pennies themselves had some nasty and deep burn-marked, and the fuse-box itself wasn't in great shape. It's a condo, so it doesn't even cost to have the box replaced, it's done by the condo corp so this is just pure cheapness/laziness.
I know that I can put at least one of these things against the former owner, as the nice thing about pennies is that they have dates on them (so a 2007 penny couldn't have been used in a fuse-box prior to 2007)... but what exact charges I want, or how much it costs to stick them I don't know. This is not to mention the initial legal fees that I would be burdened with in addition to the repairs I'm currently doing... and the somewhat frightening possibility that Mr do-it-yourself handyman may have other potentially deadly surprises hidden somewhere. With all this, there's still a possibility I could lose (homes are pretty much "buyer-beware" but I'm looking at something more like "negligence" or "endangerment" charges. I'd also like to make sure that Mr. Handyman doesn't kill his wife and two children in the new house by attempting more half-ass patchwork. The potential that bringing up a lawsuit would have me have to pay both my own and the defendant's legal bills is pretty frightening though... and one I'm very jittery about chancing.
While I'd like to think that many people are as stoic as you, I certainly am not: I'm within 10 years of retiring, quite early because I've spent the last 15 years putting everything I can in savings and investments rather than buying new cars. I'd sure hate to lose all that and have to work until 70. Sure, risking that is part of making the world a better place, but it's not rational to expect that most, or even many, people will bet their personal future to make the world a little tiny bit better. It's a matter of proportion: I don't drive 100 miles an hour because that has a very poor risk/reward ratio -- I endanger many people and only get where I was going a short while earlier. But, likewise, it would also be stupid for me, personally, to throw away my future to be a single data point in the fight against big corporations. I don't like saying this, but faced between surrendering, even if I was in the right, and losing everything I've worked for this last 15 years, I wouldn't even hesitate.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
I can't agree with you. Giving in to blackmail or extortion is NEVER fiscally responsible, nor is it socially irresponsible.
If you had some guarantee you could believe that paying up this time would prevent ever having to pay up again - for any reason - it may be personally responsible, but here you have no guarantee at all, so you might have to pay out to every spammer who gets your email address - uh, I mean every lawyer who finds out about your willingness to pay rather than fight.
As I see it, in the long run the ONLY fiscally, personally, and societally responsible thing to do is fight 'to the last ditch' (or to the geeks out there, 'to the pain') if you are falsely accused rather than pay to 'make it go away'.
I do agree with you that the RIAA (actually, ANYBODY) should be held responsible for the financial burdens defending against baseless attacks imposes.
I am also for the corporate death penalty for the RIAA and others that abuse the legal system for profit. I think they should forfeit their charter, have their assets sold at public auction, and their board of directors forbiden from ever serving on another board of directors.
I also think the in-house, corporate legal shills should face a professional 'death penalty' consisting of losing their legal certification.
The problem I see is that the only one with a penalty is the defendant, the plantiff should also face penalties for stupid pet tricks, and, while lawyers may be necessary for some things, corporate lawyers for the purpose of suing the general public are almost never necessary. Give them the chance to do the right thing, but don't give them TWO chances to do the right thing.
Acts of massive stupidity are almost never covered by warranty. --me.
In general, the idea of granting legal fees to the winner is something that is a tricky balancing act for fairness.
Most of the time, the person filing the suit should not get their legal fees, because most of the time, if the outcome isn't enough to justify the fees, why did you file in the first place? Generally, if you need to sue someone, the harm should be worth the cost to the society at large (court costs) and worth the legal fees or why did you sue?
The idea of granting fees to a winning defender is more interesting, but suffers from the problem of unequal footing. If I want to sue Microsoft or Google or Ford, they can immediately pile up bazillions of dollars of legal fees in their defense. If I lose, I lose _everything_ for the mistake of suing them. I might even be in the right, but have lost because their lawyers were better, and I would be punished for the temerity of suing.
Therefore, in the case of successfully defending against a lawsuit, the standard in the US has long been that for the defender to get their fees, they need to prove that the lawsuit was more than just wrong, but was somehow evil, that it was frivolous, or harrassing, or otherwise created with the full knowledge that it was without basis in the first place.
In the case presented here, the district court, and the appeals court both said, "The owner of the IP address is a reasonable target to sue. If you find out that he wasn't the one who infringed, well and good, we dismiss the suit, but that didn't make it frivolous."
That's not a COMPLETELY ridiculous position. Of course, we know, and the defendant claims that the RIAA makes no effort to confirm identity before it sues, and that therefore, the suit was frivolous in that sense, but on face, the idea isn't insane, only their implementation of it.
The problem is, if we change the rules so that the successful defendant AUTOMATICALLY gets their legal fees, the precedent will not be restricted to RIAA cases, and the chilling effect on consumers may well be "bad"
Most of that badness can be eliminated by a system of caps on recovered fees similar to the cap on legal fees for lawyers working on social security disability cases, but that requires legislation, and should not be put into place by an activist judiciary.
Our legal system is an adversarial one, which has the tendency to mean that the more you can pay for it, the more likely you are to have a much better outcome.
Why is that? Why is a fundamental right, that of equal justice, dependent upon your wealth?
People talk about making health care a fundamental right, what about taking back our fundamental rights to fair justice? Let's start making the legal system work FOR the people, instead of people subject TO the legal system.
Don't misunderstand -- I'm not arguing with you. You're right, in all particulars. I'm saying that I would do something I know is wrong because the cost of doing what is right is unacceptable to me.
When I walk up to an intersection, I stop even though in my state cars are required to yield to pedestrian traffic. It is not worth it to me to get hit by a car and spend months in the hospital even though I would be in the right. That is not a fight I will pursue because the price outweighs the product. I see this situation as being similar: it's a principled fight but not a rational one.
To answer your final question: I see using wealth to retire early as making my life better. That *is* protecting myself, in one sense of the term: protecting myself against an uncertain, difficult life. You're talking about an entirely different sense of protection: that of not being victimized.
The question, then, is: which one is more important?
I think your answer depends both on what you value and how much you value it. If I had $36 in savings, I'd be a lot more willing to stand up for my rights in the face of bankruptcy.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.