First RIAA Lawsuit to Head to Trial

mamer-retrogamer writes "Out of 14,800 lawsuits the RIAA has filed in the past two years, none have gone to court - until now. Patricia Santangelo, a divorced mother of five living in Wappingers Falls, New York, found herself the target of an RIAA lawsuit and vows to contest it. Santangelo claims that she knows nothing about downloading music online and the likely culprit is not her but a friend's child who used her computer. The RIAA disagrees."

Song choices

[jimmyhat3939]

I think, perhaps, the criminal authorities should be pursuing this poor woman, for her choices of music to download:

• Lit "Happy"
• Incubus "Nowhere fast"
• Third Eye Blind "Semi-Charmed Life"
• UB40 "Can't Help Falling in Love"
• Godsmack "Whatever"
• Foo Fighters "Breakout"

What? No Limp Bizkit? No Britney Spears? No Kanye West?

hmmm.....

[ndruw1]

1. Monitor P2P network 2. Sue average person 3. ??? 4. Profit!

Where do I sign up?

[moehoward]

I'd like to sue her for downloading that music as well.

My god. It is like going to a Rolls Royce dealer to steal a car and taking the Geo Metro from the Used lot.

Seriously, I'd take RIAA a bit more seriously if they placed value on the song based on market value like the judge did in the My Sweet Lord case [vwh.net].

Re:My congratulations...

[Seumas]

I congratulate you on being the first person I've ever seen who compared illegally downloading music to rape

You must be new here.

Re:Juries can judge the law

[dada21]

Juries are meant to be composed of one's peers -- people from the community who know the defendant. They should not be hand picked or completely neutral.

A jury can then judge the crime, the law AND the defendant as they'll know all 3.

Re:Of course the RIAA disagrees...

[DarkHelmet]

They'll keep repeating their truth until everyone believes it.

Kind of like the Bush administration juxtaposting Al Qaeda and Saddam.

Re:I'd like to see this go to a jury.

[ozmanjusri]

Just not on a female mother of five. If she were a male, they definitely would screw him over.

A male mother of five has bigger problems than the RIAA.

Re:I'd like to see this go to a jury.

[BKX]

Except that if they do it enough times, they'll find themselves involved in a SLAPP lawsuit. That's the real beauty. The RIAA gets one chance to win and maybe an appeal or two but after that, it will appear that they are appealling to bankrupt the defendant by continuous appeals (rather than appealling because there was a real error) and will be sued for SLAPP violations, which they will lose. And then the RIAA will be out real money and the woman will be very rich. That's why they won't appeal but once to each court they can. But you can bet that it'll be good.

The RIAA better hope..

[Hohlraum]

that she doesn't use the dreaded Chewbacca defense.

        Ladies and gentlemen of the supposed jury, Chef's attorney would certainly want you to believe that his client wrote "Stinky Britches" ten years ago. And they make a good case. Hell, I almost felt pity myself!

        But ladies and gentlemen of this supposed jury, I have one final thing I want you to consider: Ladies and gentlemen, this [pointing to a picture of Chewbacca] is Chewbacca. Chewbacca is a Wookiee from the planet Kashyyyk, but Chewbacca lives on the planet Endor. Now, think about that. THAT DOES NOT MAKE SENSE! (Background: Damnit! What? He's using the Chewbacca defense!) Why would a Wookiee -- an eight foot tall Wookiee -- want to live on Endor with a bunch of two foot tall Ewoks? That does not make sense!

        But more important, you have to ask yourself, what does this have to do with this case? Nothing. Ladies and gentlemen, it has nothing to do with this case! It does not make sense.

        Look at me, I'm a lawyer defending a major record company, and I'm talkin' about Chewbacca. Does that make sense? Ladies and gentlemen, I am not making any sense. None of this makes sense!

        And so you have to remember, when you're in that jury room deliberating and conjugating the Emancipation Proclamation... Does it make sense? No! Ladies and gentlemen of this supposed jury, it does not make sense.

        If Chewbacca lived on Endor, you must acquit! The defense rests.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chewbacca_Defense [wikipedia.org] (actually it was only on a google cache version)

Re:It's about time

[Anonymous Coward]

And as for those who claim they didn't download any music, the RIAA says that if defendants got a letter in the mail saying they or someone in their house illegally downloaded music, chances are it is true.

"Dear RIAA,

  I am writing this letter in an attempt to recoup monies lost to me in 1990-1991 by damages associated with wearing parachute pants. Your client MC Hammer sevearly and perminantly damaged my image through his pervasive use of obnoxious beats and addictive lyrics. I am seaking actual damages of $43.00 per victim and punative damages of $5,000,000 per victim.

Please contact my settlement firm of Dewee, Cheatum and Howe at 1-800-555-1234. This is a good faith effort to collect and any resistanceaction to oppose will be met with legal actions. If you take this to court I will prove my case with a preponderence of hyperbole, you cannot win. Settle now and avoid the embarrassment.

Sincerly,
The American Public

*By you or any agent of your organization reading this letter you agree to the demands set forth in this setlement proposal. You have already been found guilty by your own business method, wherein by being a recipient of said letter proves guilt. After all, we don't send these letters to just anybody [arstechnica.com].*

Re:So

[dgatwood]

Basically.

Re:14,800 lawsuits

[FirstTimeCaller]

that's a crazy $0.70 per second

You gotta admit it's a lot more profitable shakedown, er, business plan, than selling SCO licenses to Linux users.

It's not piracy!

[MarkByers]

Go after the people selling the pirated music!

Just because its ridiculously expensive doesn't mean that you can call it 'pirated music'. Jeez, people these days call anything at all 'piracy'.

The correct term for this crime is 'price-fixing'.

Re:I'd like to see this go to a jury.

[cpt kangarooski]

Sure there is at least one lawyer hangs out here

Seems unlikely to me.

Re:14,800 lawsuits

[surprise_audit]

Actually, to quote the referenced ArsTechnica article:

To date, more than three thousand people have coughed up.

I guess the other 14,000+ lawsuits are still under negotiation, though possibly some have been dropped, such as the one against the dead grandmother... That's still $9M, though. Hmm, d'you think anyone from the IRS reads SlashDot??

Re:I'd like to see this go to a jury.

[lightspawn]

Two words: pro bono. There are tons of lawyers out there itching like mad to take this case.

I thought pro bono meant you were for extending copyrights indefinitely.

Re:I'd like to see this go to a jury.

[TheRaven64]

I would really like to see her found guilty, fined $0.99 (the marked value of one song, electronically transmitted), and neither side awarded legal fees. She almost certainly has a lawyer working pro bono, the RIAA have an expensive legal team.

Re:I'd like to see this go to a jury.

[giorgiofr]

So if I step on your toe while in a crowded train you expect me to GO TO JAIL? Are you crazy or what? Oh... Kentucky... I see... sorry.

Re:Juries can judge the law

[Braino420]

If Chewbacca lived on Endor, you must acquit!

Re:I'd like to see this go to a jury.

[Anonymous Coward]

But you see, that's the fault of filesharers too. All the artists see all the stealing gone online, and their desire to write and produce new music is destroyed. So the record companies get less new music out of their artists and can't produce as many Britney clones as they wanted to.

Re:I'd like to see this go to a jury.

[Smallpond]

Imagine a non-technical jury trying to follow this:

This woman stole our IP.

How do you know?

Because her ISP gave us her IP.