Jammie Thomas v RIAA: Round III?
p2pnet news view | RIAA News:- Like so many other victims of Vivendi Universal, EMI, Warner Music and Sony Music’s RIAA, Jammie Thomas-Rasset was punished without a trial long before she ever reached a court.
She’s accused of, “stealing something which was never stolen, lying to protect her family, and in effect depriving the multi-billion-dollar corporate record labels of $1.92 million by sharing 24 copyrighted songs online,” said p2pnet recently. And in the process, she became the current RIAA poster child of what can happen to people who refuse to toe the corporate line, we added.
Then, having already been humiliated in the mainstream media, Jammie had to endure not one, but two civil trials in which she was said to have infringed music files owned by elements of the Big 4 labels. And the second time around, this very ordinary mother of four children was ordered to paid the staggering amount of $1.92 million.
Now Jammie and her lawyers, Kiwi Camara and Joe Sibley, are asking for a third trial.
“Even the plaintiffs were shocked by the verdict,” she says in a court document, going on, “That alone justifies remittitur, at a minimum.”
A remittitur is a ruling by a judge (usually upon motion to reduce or throw out a jury verdict) lowering the amount of damages granted by a jury in a civil case, says the Wikipedia.
“Mrs Thomas should no[t] be subjected to a penalty that no reasonable person could have expected would flow from the non-commercial music sharing of which she stands convicted,” says the submission, continuing »»»
But the verdict reveals a deeper problem with the statutory-damages scheme of the Copyright Act as applied in cases like Mrs. Thomas’s. The Act does not distinguish, in determining the range of statutory damages, between commercial and non-commercial infringers, between those who infringe the great prophet and those who do so for personal use, between someone who steals and reprints President Ford’s memoirs as someone who downloads Richard Marx — all these distinctions are left to the unregarded discretion of the jury. the only way in which a scheme like this can be constitutional use if the jury’s awards are subject to judicial review.
“Her attorneys’ brief (PDF) argues, among other things, that the ‘monstrous’ sized verdict violates the Due Process Clause, consistent with 100 years of SCOTUS jurisprudence, since it is grossly disproportionate to any actual damages sustained,” says Recording Industry vs The People’s Ray Beckerman, going on:
“It further argues that, since the RIAA elected to offer no evidence of actual damages, either as an alternative to statutory damages, or to buttress the fairness of a statutory damages award, the verdict, if it is to be reduced, must be reduced to zero.”
To add insult to injury, the RIAA not only wants Jammie barred from “downloading music, sharing music files and distributing songs,” it’s also demanding that she be ordered to destroy, “all copies of recordings she has downloaded without authorization,” says the Associated Press, adding:
“RIAA spokeswoman Cara Duckworth said Monday the industry is still willing to settle …”
Stay tuned.
Jon Newton – p2pnet
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi
July, 2009
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July 7th, 2009 at 10:27 am
Destroy what she downloaded but has on CD already? The point of that would be??? Right, nothing, no point, just the usual pointless demands from a pointless organization.
July 7th, 2009 at 10:34 am
LOL Pay us $1.92 million, destroy what you paid for and never use the net again.
$1.92 million is a “free” pass for life for her entire family (plus 99 years) on downloading in my books
July 7th, 2009 at 11:45 am
check out the newest mind-numbing bullshit from the RIAA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fHaAFqoVLtI
July 7th, 2009 at 12:15 pm
“all copies of recordings she has downloaded without authorization,”
What if she has some download public domain works. Certainly no one could have authorized the downloads.
If the judge ordered ordered the erasure of unauthorized copies, he abused the law, for each copied public domain work.
Then is illegal to own public domain works simply because no one authorized their copying.
Precisely that is one of the problems with downloading from the Internet or general copying of music. There is no way a casual internet user can know what is and what is not in the public domain or what copies were authorized expressly or implicitly.
And the law and its makers look sideways to the problem.
July 7th, 2009 at 12:45 pm
@surfer:
(re: “newest mind-numbing bullshit from the RIAA”)
“It’s not just a copy… it’s a CRIME”
?!?!?!?!?!?!?
Isn’t that “special”!
(See http://www.p2pnet.net/story/24581 – Cheers!)
July 7th, 2009 at 12:50 pm
@Surfer
Wow, that’s entirely pathetic (the video, not your post). I wonder if they got permission to use the Klingons…
July 7th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
Lying to the entertainment parasites is noit a crime. It is a duty!
Never admit anything to them regardless!
Ya right they never lie themselves! sure!
They are the bigest pack of liers either invented! Oh and did I mention the garbages they carry in their fat ass?
July 7th, 2009 at 1:20 pm
In the US the anemdment 8 say that what is not forbiden is authorized and that no one can prosecute someone else for something done not mentioned by the law! Hello!
July 7th, 2009 at 3:58 pm
“…between those who infringe the great prophet and those who do so for personal use…”
Hmmm, my babelfish read that and spat out:
“…between those who infringe for great profit and those who do so for personal use…”
Makes somewhat more sense to me, anyway.
July 7th, 2009 at 7:04 pm
I’ve just seen this video and my jaw had dropped all the way to the floor by the end of it. I mean, are they for real? Serious??!! First, they’re lying, copying is NOT a crime.- It’s done like a big movie production and pop video and it’s so fucking lame. Just how much did they have to pay that rapper to lose all his street cred for life?- Corporate America! Fuck yeah! Fuck you!!
July 7th, 2009 at 10:01 pm
lolz that was totally pathetic, that rapper had to have no street cred to be in that video anyhow, wonder if they get permission from some of the other things in the video.. panasonic yahoo fast freds, ricoh …
July 7th, 2009 at 11:44 pm
I hate to break it to Camera but “Harris v. Mexican Specialty Food” basically eviscerates the due process argument.
July 8th, 2009 at 1:06 am
AAHHGGG!! Ive been blinded by the BS!
)
Of course that was after i LMAO watching the utterly
fantastic, well made, polished turd sandwich………….(flame on!
Nobody with more than kindergarten education would
believe that BS unless they were PAID to!!!!
Thanks for pointing us to it surfer!!
Now, as for the post we are supposed to be commenting on, the whole verdict needs to be thrown out just for the shear stupidity of it, no real controling instructions given to the jury, and aparently no fucking inteligence shown by any of the 12 people involved…………….throw it out, or go for 3rd times a charm???
July 8th, 2009 at 7:18 am
What kind of drugs are these people on!? This is obviously not a jury of “peers” at any rate. How is it possible to dream up a nonsensical number like that? Isn’t there some sort of formula that has to be applied to justify it? PLEASE tell me that this cannot stand or I will have to plunge into a nuclear reactor and hope that I reemerge with super-powers in order to start kicking some sense into people! Something is incredibly amiss.
It is obvious that we need to start fighting fire with fire. I say we hold an open forum for suggestions on how to actively change the laws that are being leveraged against people solely in the name of greed. At the same time we should start putting together some PSA’s and start unspinning the spin doctors with the age old values of “the golden rule” and how we (my generation, at least) were taught to SHARE as children. The copyright laws were not intended for the digital era, and the letter of the law is being exploited by a bully-machine who has found itself obsolete in the new age. How can courts use historical precedent for something that has essentially no history? The time has come now. Evolution or Revolution!
August 15th, 2009 at 11:20 am
This Kiwi kid demanded a second trial and increased jammie’s damages ten-fold. Do they really want another trial? The plaintiffs have a big war machine and they’ll just get better and better at pushing the right buttons and pretty soon she’ll owe all the money in the world. If the system is as corrupt as everyone thinks, what’s the point?