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Jammie Thomas Hit With $1.5 Million Verdict
suraj.sun writes with this excerpt from CNET: "Jammie Thomas-Rasset, the Minnesota woman who has been fighting the recording industry over 24 songs she illegally downloaded and shared online four years ago, has lost another round in court as a jury in Minneapolis decided today that she was liable for $1.5 million in copyright infringement damages to Capitol Records, for songs she illegally shared in April 2006. ... The trial is the third for Thomas-Rasset, after one jury found her liable for copyright infringement in 2007 and ordered her to pay $222,000, the judge in the case later ruled that he erred in instructing the jury and called for a retrial. In the second trial, which took place in 2009, a jury found Thomas-Rasset liable for $1.92 million. Thomas-Rasset subsequently asked the federal court for a new trial or a reduction in the amount of damages in July 2009. But earlier this year, the judge found that amount to be 'monstrous and shocking' and reduced the amount to $54,000."
It actually goes on.
But earlier this year, the judge found that amount to be "monstrous and shocking" and reduced the amount to $54,000. Following that, the RIAA informed Thomas-Rasset that it would accept $25,000--less than half of the court-reduced award--if she agreed to ask the judge to "vacate" his decision, which means removing his decision from the record. Thomas-Rasset rejected that offer almost immediately.
The judge's decision stood as a great precedent.
Therefore, the scumwad MafiAA lawyers tried to extort Thomas to have the judge's decision vacated - essentially, make it invalid so that nobody else the MafiAA extortion racket targets can hold up the judge's decision as precedent against them.
Also:
Updated at 8:20 p.m. PT with comment from Thomas-Rasset attorney, and at 9:10 p.m. to emphasize the illegal sharing aspect of the copyright complaint.
Why is it Cnet doesn't say who told them to do that? Some subhuman MafiAA goon lawyer wants to remain anonymous. How typical of them.
And that's if they even bother keeping track of royalties. Robert Fripp has been fighting for years to even get a proper accounting for the sales of King Crimson and his other records from UMG after it swallowed his old record company.
Record companies are some of the biggest crooks in the business. In the 40s and 50s they took advantage of a lot of artists, paying them peanuts. Even with really big artists like the Beatles they played dirty pool. They tried to screw John Lennon around by paying him Beatles-era royalty rates for his solo stuff despite the fact that he had negotiated higher rates after he left the Beatles. For some time EMI/Capitol was withholding royalties from the Beatles, and it took a court action to finally force open their claws. Then there's the breaches of contracts like EMI did against Pink Floyd over selling songs on online services, despite the fact that the contracts very explicitly stated that the albums were to be sold as a single unit.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Filing chapter 7 will discharge all debts except student loans, back Federal taxes, child support, restitution (due to *criminal* not civil acts), homeowner's fees, debts obtained via fraud.
Source: Federal bankruptcy code, 11 U. S. C. 523.
If this were a criminal case, and she owned the millions, yes; she would be stuck with the debt for life. This is civil.
P.S.
The Canadian version of RIAA (CRIA) owes *billions* to various singers for music that was used in greatest hits CDs, or TV ads, but never compensated. You see stealing is a-okay if you are the Masters. But not for us Serfs or Artists... we just get screwed.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Unless a judge rendered willful and malicious injury in a verdict, this isn't relevant.
It would be relevant if the plaintiff took songs from an artist, burned them on a CD, and sold them for cheap in front of a music store, or if someone copied a commercial program, sold copies of it in front of Fry's and it was proven they were doing that just to cause harm intentionally to the developer.
This has never been proven in any of the trials. So, yes, she can declare bankruptcy.
There was never supposed to be a major nasty punishment in law for noncommercial activity. Copyright laws weren't written to assault someone who photocopies a chapter of a book to study from, or even the whole book. They were written to go after the guy who set up a printing press in a warehouse, or an LP-pressing machine, or a CD-burning machine, started burning bootleg copies and then selling them on the street corner or somewhere else for profit while undercutting the copyright owner.
Actually, they were written to go after anybody that violated them, and whack them with draconian penalties to make up for the low probability of whacking any particular mole.
The classic precedent is a church choir director who bought sheet music for a song that was scored for voices far squeakier than his choir, transposed it down to make it singable by ordinary people, ran off a few copies for his choir, and sent the modification back to the publisher, gratis, to be used in future editions if the publisher chose to do so. He got whacked for the statutory penalty big bucks (which were worth a lot more in those days) for each of the copies of the derived work he made.
As to "the guy who sets up ... in a warehouse ... a CD-burning machine ... started burning bootleg copies and then selling them ... for profit while undercutting the copyright owner", it also applies to the guy who does the same except he gives them away. THAT's what she's charged with. The file-sharing software made them available for some potentially large number of downloads by others.
I don't like it either. But let's not misconstrue the law or the situation. It confuses the issue.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
So, 24 songs are worth $222,000... no, actually it's $1,920,000... wait, I mean $54,000... did I say that? I meant $1,500,000...
Who the hell decides these amounts? The guy who wrote the Windows file copy dialog?
Just look up "restitution" in google news for recent settlements:
$53,824 for stabbing someone in Pittsburgh.
$150,000 for selling 15 skid steer loaders (whatever they are, they sound big).
$1.5M for giving away 24 songs
See? The law makes perfect sense.
Intron: the portion of DNA which expresses nothing useful.
In fact every copyright act I've read is explicitly not merely a regulation on business, as they specifically assign liability for infringement even if it isn't commercial in nature.
You are ignorant then. It was only in 1997 that non-commercial infringement became a criminal offense.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
Hi Ray - any chance of explaining why there is another trial here? It isn't clear from the article.
trial -> invalidated
trial 2 (effectively the first trial)
trial 2 appeal (it's an appeal)
trial 3 (why, how?)
thanks!
The 1st trial had to be done over because the Judge had been misled by the RIAA as to the applicable law on what it takes to violate the distribution right. The Judge later did some reading, realized his mistake in believing the RIAA lawyers, called a foul on himself, and scheduled Trial #2.
Although he had made similar mistakes in Trial #2, he didn't call a foul on himself there. The jury returned another huge verdict. There he was looking at the verdict from the damages standpoint only. He declined to reach the constitutional issue [in my view erroneously] and decided it on "remittitur" grounds [a general 'common law' remedy]. He granted "remittitur" and reduced the verdict to $54,000, but this was provisional only -- the RIAA was given an option to either accept the award, or have a new trial. The RIAA opted for a 3rd trial instead.
The judge set it down for a 3rd trial -- on the damages issue only. I don't know why the judge thought it appropriate to have a 3rd trial. I think he was wrong.
Ray Beckerman +5 Insightful