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Oregon Judge Says RIAA Made 'Honest Mistake,' Allows Subpoena
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "In Arista v. Does 1-17, the RIAA's case targeting students at the University of Oregon, the Oregon Attorney General's motion to quash the RIAA's subpoena — pending for about a year — has reached a perplexing conclusion. The Court agreed with the University that the subpoena, as worded, imposed an undue burden on the University by requiring it to produce 'sufficient information to identify alleged infringers,' which would have required the University to 'conduct an investigation,' but then allowed the RIAA to subpoena the identities of 'persons associated by dorm room occupancy or username with the 17 IP addresses listed' even though those people may be completely innocent. In his 8-page decision (PDF), the Judge also 'presumed' the RIAA lawyers' misrepresentations were an 'honest mistake,' made no reference at all to the fact, pointed out by the Attorney General, that the RIAA investigators (Safenet, formerly MediaSentry) were not licensed, rejected all of the AG's privacy arguments under both state and federal law, and rejected the AG's request for discovery into the RIAA's investigative tactics."
The words "honest" and "RIAA" don't even belong in the same sentence. /sigh
Yes. Truly amazing. The RIAA lawyer tells the judge that the University will destroy the data if the motion is not granted. Leaving out the fact that the University told him that the data has been preserved. And the Judge "presumes" that that was an "honest mistake"?
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
Several years ago a New Mexico Judge (IIRC) instructed the RIAA to bring further suits against individual defendants rather than join several in one action. For example, there is no accusation here that the various students acted in concert to infringe copyrights -- whatever each of them allegedly did, it was done on an individual basis. Did the University raise this issue with the judge? Does the ruling address it?
Well you're certainly on top of the issues. A number of judges, more than a dozen, have held that it is illegal to join the John Does. But the University did not raise it. The tenor of the motion was that they were looking out for the University's interests rather than those of the students.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
Do you know if this is this an appealable order?
Good question. Actually, there's a split of authority on the subject. In several circuits the order is appealable as of right. In at least one circuit, the order is not appealable as of right. I don't happen to know how they would rule in the Ninth Circuit.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful
I'm sorry Ray, but just how does an outside observer not draw the conclusion that the legal system is inherently corrupted? I know you can't answer the question (at least not publicly) and I and many others support your valiant efforts. However, its hard as someone from outside the US to not see your country as just the world's biggest banana republic. Where the law has the appearance of granite and the firmness of quicksand. A legal system whose flexibility is only ever exercised to the favour of power, never the other way. As an amateur student of early American history and the founding of your nation, I just find the underlying hypocrisy galling and the fall of the republic utterly disheartening.
I'm not here to be an apologist for erroneous decisions like this. In my blog post, after reporting the facts, I then wrote this editor's note:
Is it just me, or does this decision make no sense whatsoever? The Judge recognizes that the RIAA's investigation is insufficient to actually point to a copyright infringer, and that the only way to determine that there was a copyright infringement is to conduct a further investigation....but is directing the University, anyway, to turn over names of people who the Court recognizes may be completely innocent?
And I wrote a lengthy article for The Judges Journal, the quarterly publication of the American Bar Association written for the judges' section, for publication in its "Access to Justice" issue, in which I criticized this type of poor judicial work as creating an uneven playing field, and made 15 specific suggestions as to what judges like this needed to do that they were not doing.
The difference between you and me is that I can't afford the luxury of getting 'disheartened'. But I do get angry. And an illogical, indefensible decision like this one ticks me off.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful