p2pnet news view RIAA | P2P:-If you’re the RIAA, your modus operandi works like this:

• Issue non-stop press statements claiming you’re being devastated by file sharers
• Claim files shared equal sales lost, even though you have zero prooof, and even though a federal judge has dismissed the assertion
• Use bogus ‘evidence’ to target someone you know doesn’t have the money or legal resources to mount any kind of defence
• Call that person a filesharing criminal (no such charge)
• Make his or her (usually her) life absolute hell for as long as possible, normally two or three years
• Go after your real target – the child or children in the household
• No need to worry about your illegal actions coming back on you. Rapists or murderers are entitled to full state or federal protection under the law. Your victims aren’t.

In other words, the Vivendi Universal, EMI, Warner Music and Sony Music extortion unit can do whatever it wants, a reality that’s become even more vivid with the continuing appoinment of RIAA hacks to the US Department of Justice.

People being sued for something they didn’t do, “are expected either to turn in their acquaintances, friends, relatives and children upon mere suspicion of their downloading music, or else face crushing liability,” said lawyer Richard Altman (right).

Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG’s (as the latter was at the time) RIAA had dropped its claim against Rolando Amurao, instead going after his daughter, Audry, the true target, demanding $25,000 for 34 alleged copyright infringements.

“Plaintiffs’ accounting of the history of this action reveals what their true motivation is,” said Altman in a court document, “not the seeking of appropriate relief for copyright infringement, but rather the terrorizing of individuals and their families.

“Extortionate and non-negotiable demands for settlement are made before and after litigation is commenced, but defendants who have the temerity to defend themselves or refuse to implicate others are somehow blameworthy, and they are expected to cooperate fully or be sanctioned if they don’t.”

Now, having milked the phony allegations for all they’re worth, the RIAA is demanding a summary judgment, says Recording Industry vs The People.

However, the RIAA uses ‘evidence’ supplied by disgraced RIAA  ‘private investigator’ MediaSentry to support its allegations, and the company has been fired by the RIAA since the Amurao case was launched.

It’s now owned by rival online scalp-hunter MediaDefender.

Will victims now demand an explanation from the RIAA as to why it abandoned MediaSentry?

Will they also demand the  company’s new owner turn over records of individual cases for detailed and in-depth scrutiny?

Stay tuned.

Jon Newton- p2pnet

April 8, 2009