Posted on 06/19/2009 5:28:53 AM PDT by Red in Blue PA
A federal jury Thursday found a 32-year-old Minnesota woman guilty of illegally downloading music from the Internet and fined her $80,000 each -- a total of $1.9 million -- for 24 songs.
Jammie Thomas-Rasset's case was the first such copyright infringement case to go to trial in the United States, her attorney said.
Attorney Joe Sibley said that his client was shocked at fine, noting that the price tag on the songs she downloaded was 99 cents.
She plans to appeal, he said.
Cara Duckworth, a spokeswoman for the Recording Industry Association of America, said the RIIA was "pleased that the jury agreed with the evidence and found the defendant liable."
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
Sorry. Mods can delete.
There are high school kids who have downloaded thousands of songs and they get fined $0.
“Unusual punishment.”
Another example of corporate companies that gouge people in prices but when joe public does something slight against them, its a wall of lawyers.
CD’s and dvds cost so much to buy and so little to make and the artist gets so little from it, i find it hard to feel sorry for corporate music companies.
WTF?!!
ask for a bailout and 2 have government control record industry
Insanity!
She should be fined (and pay costs). But the fines should not be thousands of times the cost the stolen items.
She must not have made enough contributions to Obama’s election...
How do corporations gouge you in prices? Have the put a gun to you head and forced you to buy their stuff?
If a company charges “too much” for something, do you think you should be allowed to steal it?
Do you think that 99 cents is too much money to ask for a song someone wants to listen to?
Do you think that if you write a song, someone else should be allowed to take that song, and put it up for distribution to others on the internet so that you don’t get paid for it?
About the only thing I agree with on these threads is that $1.9 million is too much to be fined.
Anyhow, this is so absolutely ridiculous. I am ALL for prosecuting illegal downloads, but this kind of fine is PERsecuting. I'm sure that the Pleased-as-Punch RIAA is thinking, "Yeah, it's a sad story and a harsh fine, but we have to make an example of someone." Hell, why not cut off her hands?
Better not have been a William Hung song.
I don’t download music (legally or illegally)so I don’t know how it works but I’m curious as to what evidence a record company would have to produce that the song was,in fact,downloaded (that is,was actually saved to the hard drive) and how do they prove that it was not,in fact,paid for?
Counting the jerk who stole my cell phone and downloaded $193 worth of songs before I was able to get the account suspended. I get stuck with the bill and the bother of getting the bill charges dropped, and this punk is walking around Scot free laughing about how he got away with something.
I would further want to know how they prove WHO was the person doing the downloading. Just because someone owns a computer, it is possible there are other users.
The thing is, if you allow it to proceed to trail, anything can happen, there are no sure outcomes in trial. The way the prosecution normally fights most of these copyright cases is that they offer to settle for $X,000. What happens is that the accused goes to find a lawyer only to find out that the ones licensed to practice in Federal courts, usually want $7-10,000 just for the retainer, so most of them settle as low as the petitioner will accept; and most of the settlements include a clause which can default to the highest award possible under the law.
Fact is, the petitioner would rather settle them like this because it’s sure money, just like it’s better for the accused because anything can happen in a trial, as this poor woman has just learned. Sad part is, she probably won’t win on appeal either.
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