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Washington Woman Sues RIAA for Attorneys Fees 115

Posted by CowboyNeal from the time-and-recompense dept.
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "A Washington woman sued by the RIAA has asked the Court to award her attorneys fees, after the record company plaintiffs (Interscope Records, Capitol Records, SONY BMG, Atlantic Recording, BMG Music, and Virgin Records) dropped their case against her after two years of litigation, in Interscope v. Leadbetter. The brief submitted by her attorneys (pdf) pointed out the similarity between Ms. Leadbetter's case and Capitol v. Foster. In the Leadbetter case, as well as Foster case, the RIAA sued the woman solely because she had paid for an internet access account, and then later in the case attempted to plead 'secondary liability' against her without any factual basis for doing so. This tactic had been repudiated by Judge Lee R. West in Capitol v. Foster as 'marginal' and 'untested' in his initial decision awarding attorneys fees, and in his later decision denying the RIAA's motion for reconsideration."
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Washington Woman Sues RIAA for Attorneys Fees More

Washington Woman Sues RIAA for Attorneys Fees

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  • Wierd (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 23, 2007 @10:42AM (#19620145)
    How is it tha I pirate music all the time and nobody comes after me, but the RIAA seems to go after many people who clearly have no evidence against them?

    • Re:Wierd (Score:4, Funny)

      by Frosty Piss ( 770223 ) on Saturday June 23, 2007 @10:53AM (#19620227)
      Your day will come. And when it does, the RIAA will subpoena Slashdot's records to see what IP ( and account info, if you are actually logged in and only just checked the AC box on the input form ) is associated with your "Anonymous Coward"

    • Re:Wierd (Score:5, Informative)

      by rednip ( 186217 ) on Saturday June 23, 2007 @11:06AM (#19620311) Journal

      How is it tha I pirate music all the time and nobody comes after me, but the RIAA seems to go after
      From what I understand, they insert themselves into the P2P network, then gather the IP addresses which connect to them. After that, it's a matter of getting the IP address to match to a person's home, which isn't always easy. So to get hit by them, you need to unlucky enough to attempt to download from their honeypot, and to have an ISP which is willing to share your addressing info with the RIAA (or not to fight a court order). Basically, they need to spend a lot of money on lawyers just to get that address, and then more money to sue, and they would never be able to collect enough money to make the lawyer process self-sustaining. What they are really hoping is not to 'catch' everyone, but to scare enough people so make the P2P networks ineffectual.

      • Re: (Score:1, Interesting)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Surely they own the copyright, so you aren't breaking any laws by downloading from them though?

        "But your honour, I traced their IP using exactly the same techniques they used to find me, found out they owned the copyright, and intepreted them sharing the media as an open invitation to download it, obviously I wouldn't take any steps to download from anyone not in posession of the proper legal redistribution rights"

        • Re:Wierd (Score:5, Informative)

          by larry bagina ( 561269 ) on Saturday June 23, 2007 @12:35PM (#19621039) Journal

          Downloading is not a crime. The RIAA will never sue anyone for illegally downloading music. Why? A downloaded song has an established market value of $0.99.

          Uploading music (without permission) is a crime, with statutory damages of $750 per song. Whether the downloader (eg, RIAA's p2pbot) ha permission to download it is irrelevant because you didn't haver permission to upload it.

      • If they (the RIAA) participate in P2P activities to catch people leaching off them... surely that's entrapment?

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by Elemenope ( 905108 )

          Not every jurisdiction has prohibitions against entrapment, entrapment only applies when the entrapping agency is an agent of the state, and it only applies (IIRC) in Criminal matters. Also, to mount an entrapment defense, there needs to be good reason to believe that the entrapped person would not, but for the entrapment, have committed the act of which they are being accused.

          IANAL, take it for what it's worth. However, I'm pretty sure in these cases, none of the above are met.

        • Well, as I understand it "entrapment" only applies to activities performed by law enforcement. Besides, they aren't encouraging people to illegally download music in order to nail them, they're just observing network activity. Now that in itself might or might not be illegal, but so far as I know it's not entrapment. I'm not a lawyer, so any Slashdotters who are, please feel free to enlighten us.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by rednip ( 186217 )
          Well, entrapement [onlinelawyersource.com] is a criminal defense, not a civil one, besides "Entrapment situations alter the risks and benefits to increase the likelihood the crime will occur.", which I don't believe they are.

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by Planesdragon ( 210349 )

          If they (the RIAA) participate in P2P activities to catch people leaching off them... surely that's entrapment?

          No. That's just a sting operation.

          "Entrapment" is when the state induces you to perform an act that you would not ordinarily perform, and then charges you with a crime for it. If the police just catch you doing something of your own free will, it's not entrapment. Even if they lie to you about not being police officers.

          What is and is not entrapment varies by jurisdiction. In MA a speed trap is entrapment, in NY it's perfectly fine. (Or so I understand: it may be completely different now.)

          (In a related

          • What is and is not entrapment varies by jurisdiction. In MA a speed trap is entrapment, in NY it's perfectly fine. (Or so I understand: it may be completely different now.)

            I believe that it varies. Around here in the city there are no speed traps. Meaning that the speed limit signs are clearly posted and don't deviate from the normal speed limit in the state by much. Just to the north of the city, the local authorities have a speed limit sign which is 25mph, which is lower than the speed limits in most other parts of the state. The officers there have been instructed to pull people over several blocks into the speed zone, and to only do so for people that are doing at least

            • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

              by Nf1nk ( 443791 )

              Just to the north of the city, the local authorities have a speed limit sign which is 25mph, which is lower than the speed limits in most other parts of the state. The officers there have been instructed to pull people over several blocks into the speed zone, and to only do so for people that are doing at least 11 over the limit.

              This is why California has speed trap laws http://www.ci.pasadena.ca.us/trans/trafficoperatio ns/pdf/SpeedLimitsBrochure.pdf [pasadena.ca.us] and has given people the right to challenge a speed lim

      • Re:Wierd (Score:4, Insightful)

        by sheetsda ( 230887 ) <doug.sheets@gmUU ... inus threevowels> on Saturday June 23, 2007 @11:50AM (#19620671)
        From what I understand, they insert themselves into the P2P network, then gather the IP addresses which connect to them.


        They sit on the networks at scan for what are likely copyright violating files (after that they should have to download the files to prove that their copyright has actually been violated, though as far as I know no one has argued this point in court). Seeing what IP addresses connect to them wouldn't get them anywhere for two reasons: 1. Being on a P2P network and connecting to other nodes isn't illegal nor does it constitute a copyright violation in and of itself. 2. Since they are the holder of the copyright, if their P2P client offered it for download (even if it wouldn't actually send that file) that'd be like giving anyone who searched for it a free license to download it since as far as the end user can tell the owner of the copyright is making it available for free download. So if you don't want to be caught, you don't share files.

        Their history of false accusations supports this method. Most people here probably remember when they sued a professor named Usher a few years ago for distributing his lectures in mp3 format on P2P.

        IANAL BTW.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by rew ( 6140 )
          They sit on the networks at scan for what are likely copyright violating files (after that they should have to download the files to prove that their copyright has actually been violated, though as far as I know no one has argued this point in court).

          In a recent Dutch court ruling, the judge came up with this by him/herself. The argument was that as the RIAA was also trying to mess with P2P networks by anouncing honeypot /dummy files, they couldn't be sure that the file offered wasn't a dummy/honeypot file.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by socz ( 1057222 )
        Hmmm, since that's how it works, i hope i can read /. from prison, being that it isn't stopping anyone i know =P

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by Icarus1919 ( 802533 )
      And, what's your name and address again, sir? We're taking a survey.

    • How is it tha I pirate music all the time and nobody comes after me, but the RIAA seems to go after many people who clearly have no evidence against them?
      Spoken like a true anonymous coward...

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Gerzel ( 240421 ) *
      Question: Do you have money, or are you tied to someone with money?

      If the answer is no then you know the reason why.
    • Peerblocker in part.

      But what gets me is how many of these RIAA targets do not have p2p software.
      Or they are dead.
      Or they don't own a computer.
      Or it turns out their IP address was used by many other people.

      How can the RIAA be wrong so often?

      • There's this magical thing called "Plausable Deniability". Suuuureeeee Grandma is the only one using the computer, etc.

        It's not really that hard to understand why so many people do anything they can to get out of the charges, is it?

    • I don't know about you, but I'm not using my own inernet connection.
  • The RIAA's position seems like "frivolous litigation" to me. I find it odd that cases like this are never cited by either side in our ongoing tort "reform" debates.

    • Re:RIAA's case seemed frivolous (Score:4, Informative)

      by calbanese ( 169547 ) on Saturday June 23, 2007 @11:40AM (#19620595) Homepage
      Thats because tort reform is a complete scam, paid for and designed to benefit one industry - the insurance industry. Insurers are not hurt by these suits (insurers can't indemnifiy insured for statutory fines and I don't think they even have a duty to defend the insureds in these suits), so they have no interest in making an issue out of them.

      Also, copyright infringement is not a tort. Its a federal staturory civil offense. So there would be no need for tort reform, just action by 269 people in D.C.

      The only ones who benefit from tort reform are insurance companies. While it is true that trial lawyers, primarly PI lawyers (who are always portrayed as the "bad guys" by the insurance industry) would be hurt by tort reform the people who are actually injured would be hurt far more than the lawyers.

      When the Bankruptcy Chapter 7 and 13 amendments were debated, one of the primary benefits cited by banks and the credit industry was that average American's interest rates would go down. Let me ask you - how much have yours gone down? If the insurance industry is able to limit damages, do you think premiums are going to go down? At least banks were honest enough to advocate in public and not use PACs and hide who was spearheading the intiative.

      Insurance companies and corporations have completely f**ked the Workers Comp systems to their benefit throughout the country and are trying to do the same with negligence and products liability.

      Sorry for the off-topic rant. (And no, I am not a PI lawyer).
      • Insurance companies are in a sufficiently strong position that tort reform wouldn't actually benefit them. They're already able to pass on the costs of paying out damages to their policyholders. Tort reform would, in the presence of a competitive insurance market, lower insurance rates while keeping insurance companies' profits as obscene as they are now. This has limits, of course--if litigation was twice as expensive as it is now, say, insurance companies wouldn't be able to pass on the costs like they
      • This is off topic but I think the prior post needs a response.
        In the case of the medical liability malpractice crisis - tort reform in Texas worked as intended. In Texas we were down to 2 insurers - one of which was started by physicians. Since Prop 12 - the number of lawsuits is running about 50% of prior lawsuits which I would interpret as the reasonable cases are probably still being filed and the 50% of nuisance cases are not being filed. The rule change allows unlimited economic damages but limited
        • TMLT is not a typical insurance company (and is an excellent idea, since the insureds are the insurers and therefore they have an incentive keep premium rates lower). As for the "dearth" of high risk specialties, those statistics which said that doctors are abandoning high risk specialties as a result of insruance premiums is flat out wrong.

          From www.citizen.org:
          "The number of ob-gyns per women of child-bearing age in the United States has grown significantly over the past decade. In 1995, there were 5
      • Wouldn't it depend on the specifics of the tort reform?
        If someone proposed to dismantle all insurance companies, and execute their lawyers, I don't see how they would see that as a benefit.

      • ...insurers can't indemnifiy insured for statutory fines...

        Why not? I think anti-RIAA insurance is an excellent idea (both as a business and as a service to the community). Pre-paid legal. For a small fee if you are popped you will either be defended or your fee will be paid. Home-schoolers do this to defend against prosecution, for example.

        Is there a law that prevents it, and if so can you cite it?

        Thank you.

        • You can always get litigation insurance. And you can get insurance to cover a judgment in a civil case.

          However you often can't insure yourself against certain risks. Many states (insurance is regulated by states, not the federal government) prohibit insurance for punitive damages and criminal penalties on public policy grounds, the thought being that you wouldn't care whether your broke the law or not since you wouldn't have to pay for it. In addition, most insurance policies have exclusions for intenti

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by FLEB ( 312391 )
      The important players-- the portals and the people who set up the networks-- even when they all but outright say "OUR SITE IS FOR MEDIA PIRACY!", can rarely be touched, since they do little more than host harmless tracker files or facilitate dumb networks with a nudge and a wink. Granted, I realize there would be problems in legislating against software or network creators. BitTorrent, for instance, was originally designed to be a P2P protocol that fostered legitimacy. The tracker file, for instance, meant

  • Maybe the RIAA will back off a bit? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Firethorn ( 177587 ) on Saturday June 23, 2007 @11:05AM (#19620309) Homepage Journal
    Sounds like a case for having the RIAA back off a little.

    Loosing cases like this would only embolden piraters(according to RIAA thinking). Even massive amounts of having to pay attorney's fees won't slow the RIAA down, that's chump change. Still, being forced to pay the fees is a bad sign for them. Not only do people see them loose, but loose so badly they have to pay the person back, making them more or less whole.
    • I guarantee you it will slow them down. They'll either have to actually be sure they'll win, or they won't sue. It does affect the fiscal risk/reward ratio as well. I guarantee you the bean counters will start screaming about the money if things go south.

      BTW, it's "losing" and "lose." :)

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by ystar ( 898731 )
      I would hope that, if she were successful, the best effect of the precedent is that it might encourage others to resist such unfair and extortionist litigation, without the fear of being unable to pay the resulting legal fees.
      • Except that this was 2 years of litigation. Attorneys aren't going to work for free for years. Also, her time, and distress. That's 2 years of her life she's never going to get back, and in the end they just said "Oh, nevermind. Have a nice life!" At this point she's probably had to put her home into hock in order to defend herself. Now here's my question - how many of you are willing to put your home/retirement/both on the line to stand up to them?

        That's why their tactics work. They know most people cannot afford to risk it. I'm thinking that wherever that special hell is for child molesters, the people that decide who get sued this way belong there too. It's one thing to be tangibly harmed by someone and have to seek legal recourse. It's another to not be harmed *at all*, and throw someone's fiscal wellbeing into jeopardy over your bottom line.

        I'm sorry. I'm a forgiving person. I'm a kind and loving person. I would love nothing more to punch a few lawyers and corporate big-wigs in the face over this one. Comparatively speaking they have nothing to lose, but from a financial standpoint, the people being sued have everything to lose by standing up for themselves. They know this, and they're doing it anyway.

        That's where I draw the line. Straight to that special place in hell with you.
        • Ah ... you must mean the room with the asbestos walls and the unshielded nuclear reactor in the middle. Yeah, that one.

          • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

            by Photonic Shadow ( 1119225 )
            No, the one with the indestructible chair with indestructible straps, where you're straped in and forced spend eternity watching, and even wose listining to, Bill O'Reilly...
            • Bill O'Reilly isn't so bad. The Oprah marathon, interspersed with tele-tubbies and the purple monster on the other hand...
            • It will be just like A Clockwork Orange - only, instead of watching ultra-violence you're watching O'Reilly. Though, I suppose they're kind of the same thing...

              In A Clockwork Orange, poor Alex had to watch many guys raping a woman. In your scenario, the poor (I say that with all sarcasm) **AA must watch Bill O'Reilly mind-raping any attempt at rational discourse.
              • I've just checked your grammer nazi link. It is in error. The proper symbol for grammer nazis is an upsidedown lower case 'e' on an adhesive label.

                You know...

                A schwa-sticker...

                PS
  • Is how the RIAA gets evidence at all.

    Are they allowed to monitor my cable connection because they feel like trying to get some proof of a crime they have no reason to believe I'm committing in the first place?

    It would be like an organization trying take photos of random people, just because "Well, I bet they will sell some drugs sooner or later - and then we'll have 'em!"

    *sigh*
    I don't get these people.

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by Elsapotk421 ( 1097205 )
      Haven't you ever heard of broadband gnomes? They crawl around the intertubes with their little notepads jotting down your favorite porn sites and p2p exchanges!

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by said213 ( 72685 )
        i'm so glad someone else said it first. those little bastards have taken to editing my posts befo

    • Re:What I never understood... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Corbets ( 169101 ) on Saturday June 23, 2007 @11:31AM (#19620515) Homepage
      No, you don't get those people. While I don't agree with most of what they're doing, they're certainly not monitoring your cable connection.

      For example, they could simply do a search on limewire, The Pirate Bay, or wherever for a piece of copyrighted material that their member organizations own. They could then download the file, watching all the IPs that offer a piece of that file up to their computer. If, upon downloading the file, they find that it is indeed copyrighted material, they have strong reason to believe that each of those IPs represents someone illegally offering the file for download to others. That's not monitoring your connection, it's monitoring their own.

      Of course, in cases like bit torrents, people will tell you that because only a small piece of the file comes from a given computer, there's no way to prove that someone had the entire file. If they didn't have the entire file, they might not have known what they were downloading and making available to others. Frankly, I think that's stretching "reasonable doubt" a little far, but I guess it's for the courts to decide.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by duerra ( 684053 ) *
        Reasonable doubt isn't a requirement of a civil suit, only in a criminal trial.
      • For example, they could simply do a search on limewire, The Pirate Bay, or wherever for a piece of copyrighted material that their member organizations own. They could then download the file, watching all the IPs that offer a piece of that file up to their computer. If, upon downloading the file, they find that it is indeed copyrighted material, they have strong reason to believe that each of those IPs represents someone illegally offering the file for download to others. That's not monitoring your connecti

      • ...they have strong reason to believe that each of those IPs represents someone illegally offering the file for download to others...

        But how do they prove it? Sure they show up to court with thier own documentation, but they are hardly an impartial witness. How can they prove that they did not make it up to collect money by extortion?

    • You voluntarily send data into a public network. Therefore, a court would likely find (if they haven't already) that you have no reasonable expectation of privacy.

      It would be like an organization trying take photos of random people, just because "Well, I bet they will sell some drugs sooner or later - and then we'll have 'em!" ... which is also legal as long as those random people have no reasonable expectation of privacy (i.e. in public), unless the amount of interference rises to the level of harassme
  • How is it tha I pirate music all the time and nobody comes after me, but the RIAA seems to go after many people who clearly have no evidence against them?

    I've never heard about anyone being prosecuted for downloading copyrighted material. Uploading, however is a different story. I think the take home message is that as long as you leech off the P2P networks and never share what you have then you're safe (at least from the RIAA).

  • Does anyone know what the actual amount of money she is asking to be reimbursed for attorney fees ? Its a two year old case so I would think it is a lot, though I don't see any dollar amounts in the original article. If a huge organization with lots of money comes after the average joe with all guns blazing, makes this person hire an attorney to fight them over a period of time, brings them close to bankruptcy, and then the case is thrown out, what recourse does a person have in the US ? If I got sued (
    • Her lawyer so far has only asked if the judge grant the request itself.
      No specific sum mentioned yet.
      It's clearly written in the motion and the [Proposed] Order granting ...
  • Presuming the judge grants her request, the RIAA will no doubt engage in their usual legal shenanigans and manage to delay any final disposition for at least another two years, during which time a lot could happen.

    • Presuming the judge grants her request, the RIAA will no doubt engage in their usual legal shenanigans and manage to delay any final disposition for at least another two years, during which time a lot could happen.

      One thing that would happen is that their exposure would probably triple.

      In Capitol v. Foster [blogspot.com], 2 1/2 months of such shenanigans caused the RIAA's exposure to increase from $55k to $114k [blogspot.com], and counting.

      • "One thing that would happen is that their exposure would probably triple.

        In Capitol v. Foster, 2 1/2 months of such shenanigans caused the RIAA's exposure to increase from $55k to $114k, and counting."

        True, but I suspect they care less about the amount of the award than the precedent. Until the time the award is actually paid in full, other defendents will be reluctant to pursue the same course.

        • Until the time the award is actually paid in full, other defendents will be reluctant to pursue the same course.
          Au contraire. I feel pretty certain that the decisions in Capitol v. Foster have encouraged other defendants to fight, and encouraged lawyers to jump into the fray.
      • "and counting"...
         
        So that means they still haven't issued a cheque?
         
        Is there anything in particular that's holding up the parade?

        • "and counting"... So that means they still haven't issued a cheque? Is there anything in particular that's holding up the parade?
          1. Yes the games continue; they've now asked for an evidentiary hearing.

          2. The judge will probably allow Ms. Foster to supplement her fee request to include the work done by her attorney during these latter proceedings.

          3. Patience. "Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceeding small."

  • bittorrent (Score:2, Interesting)

    by GregNorc ( 801858 )
    Has anyone who wasn't seeding massive amounts of people on bittorrent ever been sued? All the cases I hear about seem to involve P2P services like limewire, which seem to me at least to be what only a small percentage of people use to get music and movies, most people use torrent sites like the Pirate Bay.
  • the judge didn't just automatically award her costs, and some punitive damages against RIAA for her massive stress and inconvenice too.
  • Washington woman sues RIAA
    Washington woman likes fair play /silly mood
  • Once the RIAA loses a couple of these cases they will stop suing people. Whats the use in suing everyone if you lose all that money and then some in attorney's fees for the lost cases? I thought about slapping a RICO suit against the RIAA just for the hell of it, and they haven't even bothered me.

  • See a Breakdown of Just Who do they Sue? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Nom du Keyboard ( 633989 ) on Saturday June 23, 2007 @05:48PM (#19623569)
    I'd like to see a breakdown of just who do they sue, based on number of files shared, newness of files shared, and P2P system in use.

    Do they go after people with lots of files shared as they once said they did? Seems to me that number of shared files, once said to be >1000, is now <600, and maybe much lower still.

    Are certain songs, artists, and/or new hot sellers more likely to draw lawsuits? The supposition is that the are telling the truth when they say they log into P2P systems like any other user, search out specified files, and then list out entire shared directories. When they pick a target, they download one or two dozen files as "evidence", copying down the apparent IP address and time. What files seem to attract their attention? And what if you just didn't let any single user d/l more than 2 files from you. Might they stop by not being able to collect enough "evidence"?

    What P2P systems are they searching? KaZaA? Yeah! Limewire? Apparently on occasion. What other systems have they sued people for using, and how often?

    There are now reportedly 30,000 cases they've pursued far enough to identify users and attempt to extort settlements from. An analysis of all that data, which must be available in the John Doe ex parte lawsuits used to identify these users, ought to prove interesting enough to someone writing a paper about it and sharing their findings by now.

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