p2pnet - rss feed: Santangelo appeal dismissed
p2p news / p2pnet: It’s a bad day for ordinary men, women and children across the US. But it’s a good one for the venal Big Four record labels, Sony BMG, Vivendi Universal, Warner Music and EMI, all of whom are absolutely delighted with themselves.
First came the news that an appeal against their demands for the identity of a Jane Doe had been turned down, and now judge Colleen McMahon has denied Patrica Santangelo’s motion to dismiss a case brought against her by the labels’ RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America).
Santangelo will have to file an answer and go through pretrial discovery, and possibly a trial, as a result.
“We’re very disappointed in the court’s ruling,” Ray Beckerfman, who’s representing her, told p2pnet.
“The meaning of it, if other judges follow it, is that no one will be able to get the RIAA’s baseless lawsuits dismissed without going all through all the expense and anguish of pretrial discovery, and either a summary judgment motion or a trial.
“It also means that no one will be able to get a Copyright Act attorneys fee award until after months or years of litigation. As a result, it would be economically impossible to defend these lawsuits.
“Under the federal rules, the order is not appealable, so it is the law of the case until a final judgment is obtained by the RIAA or by the defendant.
“From this point on I will have to advise any litigants who are sued in Judge McMahon’s Part, that they have no way of defending themselves without spending thousands, probably tens of thousands, of dollars.”
Santangelo is the 42-year-old New York mother who refused the Big Four’s ’settlement’ offer under which it demanded $7,500 to stop harassing her.
McMahon recently said “love to see a mom fighting one of these” [a settlement offer].
The Big Four are relentlessly hounding people such as Santangelo in their attempts to gain control of how, and by whom, music is distributed on the Net.
Among other victims are schoolchildren and senior citizens.
The cartel is fighting a losing battle against the p2p file sharing networks which sprang up as a form of citizen protest against the labels, and people such as Santangelo are the victims.
Also read:-
turned down - Evolution site under fire November 26, 2005
dismiss - Motion to Dismiss Denied in Elektra v. Santangelo, November 28, 2005
stop harassing her - RIAA victim talks to p2pnet, September 4, 2005
fighting one of these - RIAA writes to Judge McMahon, September 7, 2005
November 28th, 2005 at 8:58 pm
It was to be expected. A one minute net search found this.
from: http://eny.dioceseny.org/0503/Law.html
Judge Colleen McMahon Honored
“The Honorable Colleen McMahon, United States Judge for the Southern District of New York, was honored as the Servant of Justice ” “The Servant of Justice award is sponsored by the Episcopal Diocese of New York and its Guild of St. Ives, an association of lawyers and judges.”
my comment: The judge is not very smart. Accepting honors from religious leaders is an act of religious corruption. So is the act of religious leaders to buy political and legal influence by honoring the power elite. What hapenned to the humility of Christ?
from: http://home.earthlink.net/~dlaw70/top10.htm
Ten Federal Judges Who MUST be Impeached for Abuse of Power
No. 2 Colleen McMahon, Southern District of New York (White Plains)
Judge McMahon commonly makes statements in open court such as, “This is not a gun society any more.” She refers to her duties on the bench as “torture” and “pain and suffering.” She pays no attention to the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure if they might happen to benefit a defendant. Judge McMahon appears to be on the verge of a nervous breakdown.
my comment: Impeach the judge.
November 28th, 2005 at 9:09 pm
“Accepting honors from religious leaders is an act of religious corruption.”
why? Judges accept honors from different orginazations around the country. why would religous leaders be any different. every judge would be corrupted by someone if you go with that logic. I’m going to coin a new word here…. “Christianphobia” seems to be running rampant in this country. those who suffer from this disease are blinded from what the teachings of christianity are all about.
having said that, perhaps the judge feels it should go to trail or a finding of fact. this could be a blessing if She can afford to continue. a judicial decision might carry more weight.
November 28th, 2005 at 9:10 pm
This ruling came as no suprise to me. I wonder what the judge called, Joan Lefkow is doing now. I wonder if she was guilty of ignoring the rights of the common man or if the one who shot her family was just plain crazy or both. Judges routinely ignore the Constitution as well as the right of the less monied. It is no wonder people have nothing but contempt for the court system.
I also find it very hypocritical of an organization such as the Christian Coalition supporting those that distribute porn (MPAA and RIAA). I believe that many will find themselves having a hard time justifying thir actions when they have to stand in front of Messiah’s government in the near future.
November 28th, 2005 at 9:24 pm
“I believe that many will find themselves having a hard time justifying thir actions when they have to stand in front of Messiah’s government in the near future.”
None of us will. We don’t justify ourselves before God. we can’t.
November 28th, 2005 at 9:40 pm
My point is that some will be punished with few stripes other with many.
Yeshua Messiah is the only one that can save us if we accept Him. However, I do not believe that very many will walk away scot free without any punishment whatsoever.
November 28th, 2005 at 9:45 pm
“why? Judges accept honors from different orginazations around the country.”
Visit the site of Episcopal Diocese of New York, which “honored” the judge. You will find that the judge has
“For the Diocese, McMahon has served as vice chancellor and a member of the Canons Committee. She sat on two important task forces: Clergy and Sexual Misconduct and the Congregational Support Plan. She also sat on two committees to elect a bishop. She is currently a member of the Standing Committee and the Guild of St. Ives.
McMahon serves as a warden for Christ Church, Bronxville. Her many church activities include membership in the choir, delegate to diocesan convention, and Sunday School teacher. She has been active as a lay preacher throughout the Diocese.”.
Look, the judge was honored by a group with a vested interest in “honoring” her. Essentially she works for the churh and the more prominent she becomes the more helpful she can for her church. She is also helped to wash her image, and her appearance on the most wanted (for impeachment) list.
Honest people have no use and need for homages.
November 28th, 2005 at 10:11 pm
No religious person nor I can understand this.
Can anyone imagine Jesus favoring the morally bankrupt music industry cartel over a person who has done absolutely nothing wrong so as to submit the person to what is essentially torture and bankrupcy and the legal system where justice is a matter of who has the money?
The judge knows not who Jesus was.
November 29th, 2005 at 12:30 am
SO?
November 29th, 2005 at 12:32 am
I’d sure like to know what in the world the judges decision has to do with the church??
November 29th, 2005 at 12:51 am
I like the poker analogy of these cases. It’s not about whos right or wrong (justice), but about who has the biggest wad of money to keep on bluffing (Weak circumstantial evidence masquerading as a foregone conclusion), which in this case will obviously be the RIAA.
November 29th, 2005 at 1:05 am
The fact of the matter is, the people who get caught by the RIAA are usually the innocent law abiding citizens. They get caught out because their knowlege of computers and technology is limited. The ironic thing is, these are the kind of people who usually go out and buy music.
People who know what their doing will not likely get caught. We (i say we because im one of them) know enough about the technical weaknesses in networks like fasttrack to avoid it alltogether, instead opting to use things like bittorrent.
So the music industry really is targeting it’s highest potential customers. They really are shooting themselves in the foot.
Now don’t get wrong, i thinkk we are all mostly innocent law abiding citizens, but the RIAA is really only targeting the vunerable and uninformed amoung us.
November 29th, 2005 at 2:29 am
…were I the CEO of a multi-billion-dollar corporation, I’d strongly consider filing bogus lawsuits against hordes of internet users using fabricated evidence of copyright infringement. It’s literally become a court-enabled, viable business model.
It’s simply not feasible for the average person to fight this sort of thing. Corporate extortion of private citizens is in real danger of becoming mainstream.
November 29th, 2005 at 2:45 am
…maybe the RIAA will inadvertently sue a Senator someday, and something will finally be done.
November 29th, 2005 at 2:48 am
In our dreams but soon as they see the name on their list it’ll magicly disapear
November 29th, 2005 at 3:57 am
That’s right, these suits are flawlessly orchestrated to avoid any possible counter litigation. You will never see millionaires and public personalities on the list, never.
November 29th, 2005 at 8:17 am
You’re WRONG!
Jesus uses an iPod! Jesus uses an iPod!
MPAA and RIAA make baby Jesus CRY!!!! ON HIS BIRTHDAY!!!!!
November 29th, 2005 at 12:55 pm
The judge overlooked the simple facts and options.
1. The p2p software has no filters to prevent the passing of works that are copyrighted and the copyright owner wants to exersize the exclusive copy right the owner has. Until such a filter is developed and implanted implanted users of the Internet cannot have the burden of being resposible that everything to verify that is copied to the hard drive is in the public domain, so that no one is a sitting duck for lawsuits.
2. That for anyone to be sued, the plaintiff must have proof that the alleged infringer has a infringing copy of the infringing file and has further distributed it. If this were not the case every Internet user is an infringer, because at one time or another a copyrightable or copyrighted work will be copied (cached) into the hard disk, voluntarily or unvoluntarily. So is the user of a camera, a photocopy machine, etc.
3. The Australia judge in the KAZAA case was smarter. He is saying to KAZAA: put a filter so that infringing copies cannot be made. Of course the colloraly is that if the filter does not work, as will surely be the case, the only options are to shut down the Internet being that the only way to prevent sharing files on the Internet or to ignore the sharing problem in the courts because copyright is an uneforceable right with traditional copyright laws.
A final note:
Imagine the grandmother of the bride taking a video o people dancing at a wedding and the video captures the copyrighted dance music and then having the grandmother sued for copyright infringement in judge Colleen McMahon’s court. The grandmother will wind up in jail because the infringement (the making of the video) was intentional as all so called infringement, and was theft (and a crime, per RIAA).
This is getting out of hand, while large scale infringement by the RIIA members and large music publishers goes unpunished. All the songs my family (over 500) owns were stolen by music publishers and we got a total of $21,000 in damages as a result of the infringement of one song. It has cost over $200,000 in lega fess to get there. One of the publishers, the self proclaimed biggest on in the world, “acquired” 16 songs (using their own written words) “without the author suspecting”. The author was my father.
BTW, a criminal complaint was made by my family against the publsher that stole the 500+ songs in 1999. The local Justice department, six years later, has not yet finished their investigation so as to decide what to do about the theft.
The legal system has been destroyed by the politicians and the judges and Colleen McMahon is one of them. Cannot help but being mad.
Rafael Venegas
http://www.gvenegas.com
November 29th, 2005 at 2:51 pm
This is one reason the Christian movement has been bleeding over the last few decades. It is called hypocrisy. The corruption buried deep within the establishment churches have been surfacing for years. I consider the Christian Coalitions’ blind support of the RIAA, MPAA, and the republican side of the mainstream party an ultimate manisfestation of the corruption within the Christian establishment. It is time for Christians everywhere to stop listening to the preachers in church and start openening and reading their Bibles, or very well lose their faith.
The only difference between the Roman Catholic church and most “protestant” churches involves simple politics. Both support oppressive movements withing the governments and industries of the world. I believe that Revelation 13 has a specific name for an entity that deceives the people. Also Revelations 16 through 20 also explains things in further detail. With so many conflicting teachings of Christianity, is there any wonder why there are so many atheists in the world?
I also believe that the book of Jeremiah also explains what is going to happen to America. Americans are just some of the descendents of ancient Israel (The “lost” 10 tribes). Our church leaders in many cases have become priests of ba’al. It is time for Christians to wake up and see what is going on and stop supporting the “Beast” and the “False Prophet.” Does your church teach the lie about the “Good Friday” death of Messiah and His “Easter Sunday” ressurrection? If so, then you need to read the Bible passage about the sign of Jonah Matthew 12: 38-40 as well as Daniel 9-27. One also should become familiar with the Holy Days in order to know why Messiah was crucified before the beginning of the Sabbath (holy day, not weekly Sabbath). The modern Christian Church in teaching the “Good Friday - Easter Sunday” myth are trashing the only sign that Messiah gave to prove who He was .
What this judge has done is joined herself to a false, feel-good religion that denies right ruling to the common people. It is only a small part of the sick society that has lost its way. America as a sovereign nation is going down to destruction, and there is no way to save her except by turning back to Constitutional government and the Bible.
November 29th, 2005 at 5:36 pm
This woman is fighting for ALL of us. So many times I’ve seen posts saying “stand up and be counted”, or “fight them”, well, nows our chance. I reckon theres 16 million filesharers, ok, so 10% of us donate 1 dollar, thats like 1.6 million dollars, then she can afford to fight, after all, its ALL of our fight. I Personally would Trust Jon and this site to run it,My money is ready, How about a fund then Jon?
Bri.
November 29th, 2005 at 8:43 pm
I’ve been a regular reader and poster here for some time. During that time, Rafael Venegas has steadily beaten a drum exposing just how justice works. I have read a lot of his posts, he always signs them.
Of late he has been on a roll with better and better posts. Posts of logic and reason that are just hard to beat.
Good job, Rafael.
December 26th, 2005 at 1:58 am
If these writers are worried about copyrights, then stop writing songs. Let them get real jobs and do some work and worry about getting callousies. It’s music you hear on tv and radio. Should I be restricted and not allowed to look at art? or a building or a tree. Stop writing music if you don’t want people to listen to it! If you can’t be productive to society stop harrasing it!
December 26th, 2005 at 1:58 am
If these writers are worried about copyrights, then stop writing songs. Let them get real jobs and do some work and worry about getting callousies. It’s music you hear on tv and radio. Should I be restricted and not allowed to look at art? or a building or a tree. Stop writing music if you don’t want people to listen to it! If you can’t be productive to society stop harrasing it!
December 26th, 2005 at 4:15 pm
The music industry is allowed unencumbered license to enter the entity that is Ms. Santangelo’s private life. Not only is this an unfair intrusion into the privacy of Ms. Santangelo by the music industry, but by not dismissing the Judge is allowing this case to remain sanctioned on its own merit as judicial legislature. This marks the disappearance of privacy as a basic human right. Also the tenet of innocence until proven guilty. Any human being who has touched the interent knows that the majority of the traffic which either crosses or resides upon the home PC is not of the pro forma owner’s doing. If piracy is the issue why are the damages being flogged from the residents of the harbor where the pirates have anchored? A working mother sued for damages by the music industry under these circumstances? I personally will never purchase another recording from the music industry. Where can I send some help to Ms. Santangelo. Everyone who values their privacy should be reaching into their pocket to help this woman.
December 26th, 2005 at 4:16 pm
The music industry is allowed unencumbered license to enter the entity that is Ms. Santangelo’s private life. Not only is this an unfair intrusion into the privacy of Ms. Santangelo by the music industry, but by not dismissing the Judge is allowing this case to remain sanctioned on its own merit as judicial legislature. This marks the disappearance of privacy as a basic human right. Also the tenet of innocence until proven guilty. Any human being who has touched the interent knows that the majority of the traffic which either crosses or resides upon the home PC is not of the pro forma owner’s doing. If piracy is the issue why are the damages being flogged from the residents of the harbor where the pirates have anchored? A working mother sued for damages by the music industry under these circumstances? I personally will never purchase another recording from the music industry. Where can I send some help to Ms. Santangelo. Everyone who values their privacy should be reaching into their pocket to help this woman.
December 26th, 2005 at 4:19 pm
Yeah
Just provide the details,
petemckenna38@excite.com