Xbox Modding Trial Dismissed

It seems the harsh words from District Court Judge Philip Gutierrez on Wednesday had their intended effect; prosecutors in Matthew Crippen's Xbox modding case have now dismissed the indictment. Quoting Wired: "Witness No. 1, Tony Rosario, was an undercover agent with the Entertainment Software Association. He told jurors Wednesday that he paid Crippen $60 in 2008 to modify an Xbox, and secretly videotaped the operation. Rosario had responded to Crippen’s advertisement on the internet and met Crippen at his Anaheim house. All of that had been laid out in pretrial motions. But during his testimony, Rosario also said Crippen inserted a pirated video game into the console to verify that the hack worked. That was a new detail that helped the government meet an obligation imposed by the judge that very morning, when Gutierrez ruled that the government had to prove Crippen knew he was breaking the law by modding Xboxes. But nowhere in Rosario’s reports or sworn declarations was it mentioned that Crippen put a pirated game into the console. ... [Prosecutor Allen Chiu] conceded he never forwarded that information to the defense."

Comments

'Never forwarded that information'

[unity100]

Basically, they lied. dipshits. And how the hell did that Rosario guy knew that cd was pirated in the first place anyway ? did he understand it from its smell ? cd wasnt labeled ? what if the guy made a backup ? huh ?

ehh. pointless. they are lying and slyfoxing their way. that is as good as justice gets in a land where money buys everything.

Re:'Never forwarded that information'

[justin12345]

Unless he invited Rosario to take the (assumed copyrighted) disc with him it wasn't pirated, just a copy. Copies are protected under fair use, distributing copies is not. Using a copied disc would be a necessary step in determining if the procedure was effective, so it would be impossible to perform the procedure without one. Therefor he did nothing wrong, even if the DMCA (which contradicts the CoTUSA) might disagree.

Re:'Never forwarded that information'

[Moryath]

Calling it "Piracy" is the wrong word. We should call it "Jesusing."

Think about it. Jesus took fish and bread, copied them, and gave the copies out to the hungry poor for free. I bet the fishermen and bakers weren't too happy about it either.

Re:Surprised? Surely not.

[RobertM1968]

The ESA, government and ??AA caught being sneaky and underhanded in order to fuck over another citizen? I'm surprised it's even news except when the tallies of nefarious activities they've been caught at passes each 100/1000/n+^10 milestone. And yet they still get to do business.

This story is definitely news. The judge went back and read up on the DMCA, allowed for a fair use claim as reasons to mod the things, and then slammed the prosecutors for each and every mistake and lie and crime they committed.

I dont think I've ever seen such happen in any such case brought on by the BSA, ESA, RIAA or MPAA before. Sure, there've been ones where the judge used common sense and was stern... but this judge truly went all out to put the ESA and the prosecutors in their places.