Jammie Thomas Asks Judge to Throw Out "Monstrous" Verdict
Posted 07/07/09 at 07:23:14 PM by Paul Lilly
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It's been a roller-coaster of a legal ride for Jammie Thomas, who was found guilty of copyright infringement for sharing 24 songs through KaZaA, a P2P file sharing application. After the dust settled, Thomas was ordered to pay $1.92 million in damages, an amount levied against her in a retrial of the case and much higher than the original $220,000 verdict she received in the original case.
In a motion filed today with the Minnesota federal court, Thomas called the verdict "excessive, shocking, and monstrous." As such, Thomas wants the federal judge overseeing her lawsuit to either toss out the exorbitant damage award, reduce it, or issue her a retrial.
"For 24 songs, available for $1.29 on iTunes, the jury assessed statutory damages of $80,000 per song -- a ratio of 1:62,015," the motion states. "For 24 albums, available for no more than $15 at the store, the jury assessed statutory damages of $80,000 per album, a ratio of 1:5,333. For a single mother's noncommercial use of KaZaA, and upon neither finding nor evidence of actual injury to the plaintiffs, the judgment fines Jammie Thomas $1.92 million. Such a judgment is grossly excessive and, therefore, subject to remittitur as a matter of federal common law."
The record labels also filed a motion today, one which asks the judge to issue a permanent injunction against future copyright infringement. Because, you know, a $1.92 million fine apparently isn't enough of a deterrent.
Image Credit: Flickr Joe Gratz
Don't buy CDs anymore
Submitted by DavidWitteried on Wed, 07/08/2009 - 9:54pm
The music companies lost me as a customer after the Sony Rootkit scandal. I think I have bought only one CD since then and that was only after checking toughly for any DRM crud on it. I basically stopped buying music after that... I don't steal it either.
Submitted by Trooper_One on Wed, 07/08/2009 - 4:00pm
The damages awarded to RIAA is obscene! Even the original remedy falls into that realm!
Such a judgement is definately not in the interest of the public! So now her and her 4 kids will suffer because of 24 songs? (i.e. food off the table, no housing, no college funds for her kids).
This shouldn't even go to trial in the first place as this puts the administration of justice into disrepute.
However since it did go on trial, it shows that Justice and Governemnt are in the pocketbooks of power corporations and lobbying entities like RIAA.
Government + Powerful Lobby Groups combined to overwhelm a mother of four.
Absolutely shameful!
Submitted by mesiah on Wed, 07/08/2009 - 9:42pm
So, legal proceedings work like taxes now? The more kids I can pump out the more exemptions I get on my legal verdicts? Shit, I'll kick out 20 kids and then go rob some banks, I'll probably get to keep nearly all the money and maybe even get off with just house arrest. That a mother of 4 decided to gamble and got cought sucks. But that doesn't give her the right to get a pass just because she has kids to support. The eyes of the law aren't supposed to care about race, or gender, or financial situation. Only wether or not you broke the law and if your punishment fits the crime, not if your punishment fits your lifestyle.
Submitted by kurakasama on Tue, 07/07/2009 - 9:53pm
Man what a great deal. She's lucky she didnt get the death penalty, although I wouldn't be surprised if that's what they were pushing for. I think in the middle east they cut off a hand for each song you steal... So 24 songs...where does that leave her.
Submitted by wobble on Wed, 07/08/2009 - 12:16am
"Stallworth, 28, is serving a 30-day jail sentence after pleading guilty to
DUI manslaughter in the death of 59-year-old Mario Reyes. Stallworth also
reached an undisclosed financial settlement with Reyes’ family, which factored
into his relatively light sentence"
http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/news?prov=ap&slug=ap-stallworth-pedestriankilled&type=lgns
How does that happen? Did the 59-year-old throw himself in front of Stallworth's car?
Submitted by mesiah on Wed, 07/08/2009 - 9:36pm
You are absolutely right. She should go into the court room and say "Your honor, you have to believe me. I got drunk and downloaded those songs. I didn't even know what I was doing until it was too late."
While I agree that DUI offenses need to be much more strict. Accidently killing someone is still ruled an accident no matter how stupid people are when they get behind the wheel. She didn't download and share songs by accident, she knew what she was doing and was warned just like everyone else to stop.
Do I think the verdict is too high? yes, but she should have accepted the first virdict which I think was in line with typical law suits today. Do I think the guy in your example should be heavily punished, absolutely. But they are two very different circumstances.
Submitted by mesiah on Tue, 07/07/2009 - 8:07pm
While 1.92M is blowing things way out of proportion, I think it sends a good message. that message is "You should have taken the first verdict and not cried for a retrial and wasted even more taxpayer dollars." 220k Is high, but I think it was within the limits of reason. She didn't want to accept her fate, so now she gets fined an unacceptable amount >.>
Submitted by wobble on Tue, 07/07/2009 - 11:57pm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitol_v._Thomas#Retrial
So it's not "wasting taxpayer dollars" at this point anymore. The first one was provided by the state of Minnesota however.
And I disagree, she is a mother of four; $220,000 is an obscene amount.
Submitted by mesiah on Wed, 07/08/2009 - 9:30pm
Just because her lawyer isnt charging her fees doesn't make the trial free. Even with court costs there are many expenses that aren't coverd.
And I'm sorry, but how many babies you can pump out should have nothing to do with repercussions in the eyes of the law. If you kill someone, should you be given a slap on the wrist because you have 6 children to feed? Yes, its a huge amount of money, on the very high end of what I would concider acceptable, but if this case was the other way around and an artist was sueing a large company for stealing 24 songs even though they didn't profit from it, $220k would be chump change. I'm sorry, but the ability to reproduce is not a valid excuse for being exempt from breaking the law.
Submitted by wobble on Thu, 07/09/2009 - 8:27am
Average citizens don't have $2 million laying around, nor $200,000 sitting in a piggy bank.
I'm not saying she should have a license to pillage and plunder because she's halfway to becoming an "octomom".
She clearly does not have that much money. How many folks do you know with 3+ kids who can pony up that much cash instantly? Where I live in the US, most folks are lucky to even have full insurance coverage because they simply can't afford a medical emergency that costs tens of thousands.
Submitted by clark1566 on Tue, 07/07/2009 - 7:04pm
Ok second time today I have read the post about downloading music being the same as kidnapping. Kidnapping involves holding a person against their will. Music is an intellectual property and therefore has no will. Sorta different. Infinity billion? Learn that in 3rd grade? I have to agree with IJedi. Should she be let off the hook or get another retrial? No. But the fines she should have to pay should be resonable and within her means to pay. If the amount is too much then she will never pay a dime and that is the same as getting off the hook.
Submitted by wobble on Wed, 07/08/2009 - 12:50am
Copyrights last longer than the creative author:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act
More info here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mhBpI13dxkI
Submitted by clark1566 on Wed, 07/08/2009 - 2:50am
Thanks for posting this wobble. The youtube video was fascinating. I watched the whole thing. And definitely makes the point that the RIAA has no interest in the artists at all. They are protecting their distribution network. Artisit's only make about a $1.00 off the sale of a single CD. The RIAA could care less about that dollar. They want to protect the other $14-$15 that is their end of CD sales. They just use the artists to make people and the press feel guilty. Great info!
So how much goes to the RIAA's offended Artists?
Submitted by Wildebeast on Tue, 07/07/2009 - 6:55pm
I'd be more worried about her, if she hadn't tried to hide the file sharing. I don't know exactly what the time line is/was, but I felt I had lots of warning to stop Sharing, myself.
I have a big problem with the RIAA, as every time they quote "lost sales," their comparing to a time period where people were still replacing their old vinyl records with CDs. (The movie industry does the same thing, only with video tapes...)
As far as I'm concerned, the vinyl give you/me license for a digital copy of the same version of that song, by the same performer. It took a lot of work to find that sometimes, but now you pretty much have to find someone to "loan" you the CD.
At the same time, think of the performers that were HUGE in the 90s, and are now nowhere to be found. 5-15 years of skewed sales is a really big deal for those people and affected their record contracts. The lost royalties are out of people like Courtney Love's livihood!!
Submitted by wobble on Tue, 07/07/2009 - 11:47pm
Looks like the lawyers and financiers handling the Cobain estate robbed her blind
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2009/apr/08/courtney-love-nirvana-millions-missing
http://www.thetripwire.com/news/2009/04/08/courtney-love-noticed-the-money-was-gone-when-there-wasnt-any-left-usually-a-strong-sign/
"The Post’s Page Six reported that a team of investigators found that
Cobain’s estate had been 'looted' of more than $30 million in cash and
up to $500 million in real estate."
Submitted by ben628 on Tue, 07/07/2009 - 6:51pm
In response to the $1.92 million fine being a deterrent factor, it simply isn't. It's an outlandish figure to ask for, especially for only 24 songs when the RIAA can't prove its case. Quite frankly, there's no possible way for her to pay that fine within any reasonable methods. Why the RIAA can't get its head out of its ass and see that is beyond me. All this is is a scare tactic to force future victims of their terrorism to settle for less absurd amounts of money, although still far from reasonable. The picture below is an interesting comparasion that really puts the cost of life vs a song in perspective:
http://img40.imageshack.us/img40/9172/1245456677307.jpg
I feel sympathy for her, but
Submitted by I Jedi on Tue, 07/07/2009 - 4:50pm
I feel sympathy for her, but we all know that the RIAA is just stringing her up as an example to others of what could happen if you upload and share your music. Even people who download music aren't safe. Although, now the RIAA has stopped its onslaught of lawsuits against people.
Do I think the fine should be reduced? Yes, and no... The problem is that the RIAA, the court, and Jammie Thomas all know she'll never pay it all back, which makes such a claim of money ridicilous. However, she did break a copyright law and should be subject to pentalty. The RIAA, obviously, is playing this as if for every potential song downloaded, they lost huge numbers of profit per song. It's a crazy and staggering large sum of money.
She should, in my opinion, be charged no less than $1,000 dollars per song that she is being charged for. This makes it a hell of a lot more reasonable and can actually be paid off. That way the RIAA actually sees some of the money and it serves as a for warning that companies aren't messing around. This way the idea of paying 24K sounds a lot scarier than the idea of paying 1.92M, which sounds ridicilous.
$1000 per song? Even
Submitted by Caboose on Wed, 07/08/2009 - 10:26am
$1000 per song? Even that's outragous. And that's assuming that someone downloaded the song 1000 times... These stupid fines do nothing but piss people off, and give these companies even more of a bad image. A deterrant? Hardly, The only thing it deters people from doing is spending money on the movies and music, it doesn't prevent people from downloading them sans paying...
-= I don't want to be dead, I want to be alive! Or... a cowboy! =-
Submitted by I Jedi on Wed, 07/08/2009 - 12:12pm
How then would you propose punishing those who violate copyright laws and infringe upon artist/distrubitors? Slap them on the wrist? The fact of the matter being is that what she did was gave people the ability to illegaly download songs. In other words, stealing... And a $1000 per download is a lot more reasonable than the RIAA's 1.92M. If you can find a punishment more suitable, then let's hear it.
Submitted by wobble on Tue, 07/07/2009 - 4:49pm
Copying a song is the same as kidnapping! Cyber pirates are thieves. She should have had to pay infinity billion dollars and spend the rest of her life in Guantanamo Bay.
Submitted by grayscare0 on Tue, 07/07/2009 - 8:41pm
I lol'd.
Submitted by Lestaticon on Tue, 07/07/2009 - 4:47pm
That judgment is about as unrealistic and idiotic as the false, media-hyped universe we are expected to live in. Message to everyone: Stop buying their music and movies. You're really not missing anything, anyway. Once that happens, maybe you'll see there's a lot of legitimate freely available content out here.
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