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Falsely Accused Movie Pirate Deserves $17K Compensation, Court Says (torrentfreak.com)

Posted by msmash on from the tit-for-tat dept.

An Oregon District Court has sided with a wrongfully accused man who was sued for allegedly downloading a pirated copy of the Adam Sandler movie "The Cobbler." According to the court's recommendations, reports TorrentFreak, the man is entitled to more than $17,000 in compensation as the result of the filmmakers "overaggressive" and "unreasonable" tactics. From the article: The defendant in question, Thomas Gonzales, operates an adult foster care home where several people had access to the Internet. The filmmakers were aware of this and during a hearing their counsel admitted that any guest could have downloaded the film. [...] "The Court finds that once Plaintiff learned that the alleged infringement was taking place at an adult group care home at which Gonzales did not reside, Plaintiff's continued pursuit of Gonzales for copyright infringement was objectively unreasonable," Judge Beckerman ruled. "The Court shares Gonzales' concern that Plaintiff is motivated, at least in large part, by extracting large settlements from individual consumers prior to any meaningful litigation. "On balance, the Court has concerns about the motivation behind Plaintiff's overaggressive litigation of this case and other cases, and that factor weighs in favor of fee shifting."

3 of 60 comments (clear)

  1. $17K by TechyImmigrant · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Doesn't sound sufficiently punitive to me.

    --
    I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
    1. Re:$17K by captaindomon · · Score: 5, Insightful

      This is a great precedent, though. If every falsely accused person went for damages of $17k, it would quickly alter the landscape for these studios.

      --
      Just because I can hook a shark from a boat, I do no offer to wrestle it in the water.
  2. Title missing important inverted commas by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    The title as is implies that the man is a movie pirate and was falsely accused (of something)...

    Or just change it to "Man falsely accused of movie piracy..."

    The actual article does it better, although they added the quotes to 'falsely' too for some unknown reason...: Court: ‘Falsely’ Accused ‘Movie Pirate’ Deserves $17K Compensation