Friday, December 22, 2006

In SONY v. Crain, East Texas case against Elderly Hurricane Rita Survivor, RIAA Tries to Dismiss Non-Infringement Counterclaim

In SONY v. Crain, the RIAA's East Texas case against an elderly Hurricane Rita survivor who has never engaged in file sharing, the RIAA has made a motion to dismiss Ms. Crain's counterclaim for a declaratory judgment of non-infringement. Ms. Crain's attorney, John Stoneham of Lone Star Legal Aid, has opposed the motion, pointing out -- among other things -- that a similar motion had been made by the RIAA in Capitol v. Foster, and rejected.

Plaintiffs' Memorandum of Law in Support of Motion to Dismiss Counterclaim for Declaratory Judgment*
Defendant's Memorandum of Law in Opposition to Motion to Dismiss Counterclaim for Declaratory Judgment*

* Document published online at Internet Law & Regulation

Keywords: digital copyright online download upload peer to peer p2p file sharing filesharing music movies indie label freeculture creative commons pop/rock artists riaa independent mp3 cd favorite songs

1 comment:

Alter_Fritz said...

now a pure macho comment:

Lisa L. Honey a not so smart female RIAA lawyer;

Of course a counter claim that just mirrors the original claim is from a logical POV useless IF the court would rule on the initial claim. One must not be the smartest guy in lawclass to understand that principle! (in fact you must not even be in lawclass at all, since even me has understand that principle already) ;-)

Problem, lovely Lisa, is that the guys you work for are a bunch of cowards that back off from their claim as soon as there is any sign of trouble on the horizon. And there is in more and more cases NO judgement by the courts that defendant did or did not infringed copyrights of the plaintiffs!

As John M. Stoneham put it: "Two (2) of the cases cited as authority in Plaintiffs motion have been dismissed voluntarily by the plaintiffs in each case, a fact which illustrates the need for a surviving counterclaim[...]." And the palintiffs have not only backed off in those 2 cases , but also in many others! (Ray might have the links more handy than me)

Hey honey [SCNR], not so smart to cite those cases and beginn your argument with a quote from a judge like "“The issue of
copyright infringement will be decided by this Court regardless of the declaratory judgment
claim . . . Therefore, defendant’s claim for a declaratory judgment is redundant and
unnecessary.”" , when Plaintiffs behaviour in more and more cases show that this initial deciding will not happen!