Santangelo, Foster and the RIAA
p2pnet.net news:- Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG, the members of the Big 4 music cartel, are using their RIAA to try to hammer home two extremely dangerous (to them) cases which are slowly working their way through the US civil justice system.
Both involve mothers the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) accused of illegally distributing copyrighted digital music files online.
It’s been unable to bring either case to a winning conclusion and rather than apologising to Debbie Foster, in the first instance, and Patti Santangelo, in the second, it’s doing everything it can to avoid the consequences, continuing to harass them in the process.
With Foster, after seeing its case dismissed, the RIAA was told to pay her “reasonable” lawyers’ fees and hand over billing information.
Instead, it, “moved for ‘reconsideration’ of the Court’s order determining that Ms. Foster is entitled to an award of her reasonable attorneys fees, the RIAA’s motion for permission to file a reply brief – responding to Ms. Foster’s opposition papers – has been granted,” said Recording Industry vs The People’s Ray Beckerman.
“Judge Lee West gave the RIAA until March 22nd to file the additional papers.”
For more than a year the courts have been ordering the RIAA to hand over the documents, but to date, they haven’t produced even one.
What are they hiding?
Now, says Beckerman, the labels are looking for a new “protective order motion” for confidentiality.
Foster’s lawyer, Marilyn Barringer-Thomson, is again asking for an order to force the Big 4 companies to comply.
What will the RIAA’s next avoidance tactic be?
Meanwhile, the meter continues to tick over handsomely for Holmes Robert & Owens, the law firm handling both cases, as well as other similar RIAA lawsuits.
Patti Santangelo
Patti Santangelo, we posted recently, is still, “determined to take her case to a civil court so she can clear her name; either that, or have her case dismissed ‘with prejudice’ so she can get on with her life.”
But the RIAA is equally determined to milk it dry, dragging it out as long as it can while it continues to go after her children, Michelle and Bobby.
“Nor does the RIAA want a date set for a trial,” said p2pnet. “It wants to keep things going without resolution for as long as possible knowing that, unlike Santangelo, a single mother of five, it has the financial and legal resources to be able to do so; and, that it’ll have to answer its allegations in depth and in detail if and when it’s actually forced to try to prove its case in a court before a jury. And that’s something it wants to avoid at all costs.”
Wrote judge Colleen McMahon (upper right):
“Mrs. Santangelo does not have to remain permanently ‘in chancery,’ she is entitled to have her legal status resolved one way or another. This case is two years old. There has [already] been extensive fact discovery.”
And of RIAA charges that Santangelo had somehow tricked the court, “Nothing in any papers filed by plaintiffs suggests IN THE SLIGHTEST [McMahon's emphasis] that Mrs. Santangelo has ever perpetrated any fraud,” she stated, clearly exasperated.
‘You’re taking up my time and cluttering up my calendar …’
Nor is this the first time an RIAA lawyer has run foul of McMahon in the Santangelo saga.
When the case opened, “I’ve always said that the Recording Industry Association of America and its member companies are perfectly within their rights to sue those they think are infringing on music copyrights through peer-to-peer file-trading of songs,” wrote Mike Godwin of Godwin’s Law fame, going on:
At the same time, it seems obvious that the RIAA should pick the lawsuits prudently, based on solid evidence, so that when the cases are publicized it will be clear that the defendants deserved what they got.
That doesn’t seem to be what’s happening, however. Instead, the RIAA notifies potential defendants that they are subject to a lawsuit that may result in hundreds of thousands of dollars of liability, and then gives them the option of settling the claim for only a few thousand dollars. It ought to be needless to say this, but sometimes an innocent defendant might still opt to take the settlement, because the risk of going to court and losing is so great.
Occasionally, however, you find a defendant who is troubled enough that he or she is willing to stand up to RIAA regardless of the risk. That seems to be the case with Patricia Santangelo. I urge you to read the transcript of Ms. Santangelo’s court appearance here. It is fun to read, and it has made me an instant admirer of Judge McMahon, who refused to be a mere conduit steering Ms. Santangelo to the RIAA’s “conference center” (which should properly be called a “surrender center”):
MR. [MIKE] MASCHIO: No, all I was suggesting, your Honor, is that, if she doesn’t come with an attorney, that the more direct way of doing this — and this is just to facilitate things — is to deal directly with the conference [read 'settlement'] center.
THE COURT: Not once you’ve filed an action in my court.
MR. MASCHIO: Okay.
THE COURT: You file an action in my court, your conference center is out of it. They have nothing to do with anything.
MR. MASCHIO: Okay. I’ll give her my card.
THE COURT: If you are here, you are here as an officer of the court. You’re taking up my time and cluttering up my calendar, so you will do it in the context of the Court. Maybe it will be with a magistrate judge, but you will be representing your client, not some conference center.
And if your people want things to be done through the conference center, tell them not to bring lawsuits.
Stay tuned.
Also See:
case dismissed – RIAA wasted move in Foster case, March 19, 2007
Recording Industry vs The People – RIAA Gets Permission to File Reply Brief in Support of “Reconsideration” Motion, March 16, 2007
says Beckerman – Debbie Foster Moves to Compel Enforcement with Order Directing Turnover of Records, March 21, 2007
Michelle and Bobby – Us, Them, p2p and file sharing, December 9, 2006
p2pnet – RIAA vs Patti Santangelo saga, March 13, 2007
run foul of McMahon – RIAA writes to Judge McMahon, September 7, 2005
Godwin’s Law – Runaround Suits, August 29, 2005
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Tired of being treated like a criminal? They depend on you, not the other way around. Don’t buy their ‘product’. Do bug your local politicians. Use emails, snail-mail, phone calls, faxes, IM, stop them in the street, blog. And if you’re into organizing, organize petitions, organize demonstrations and then turn up on your local political rep’s doorstep, making sure you’ve contacted your local tv/radio station/newspaper in advance. Don’t just complain. Do something!
March 23rd, 2007 at 6:00 am
Somebody NEEDS to countersue these jerks! That is the only way they are going to stop….when it starts to cost THEM money!