Tuesday, December 19, 2006

RIAA Drops Case Against Patti Santangelo

After more than a year and a half of litigation, the RIAA has sought to drop the case it brought against Patti Santangelo, Elektra v. Santangelo. Its motion papers ask that the dismissal be "without prejudice", which would mean that they could sue her again for the same thing:

Notice of Motion to Dismiss without Prejudice*
Delcaration of Richard L. Gabriel in support of RIAA's Motion to Dismiss without Prejudice*
Memorandum of Law in support of RIAA's Motion to Dismiss without Prejudice*

* Document published online at Internet Law & Regulation

This is the case that garnered so much national press attention last year. See, e.g.:

http://recordingindustryvspeople.blogspot.com/2005/12/patricia-santangelo-on-network.html
http://recordingindustryvspeople.blogspot.com/2005/12/transcript-of-patricia-santangelo-and.html
http://recordingindustryvspeople.blogspot.com/2005/08/links-to-articles-about-elektra-v.html

The case against Ms. Santangelo's 16-year old son and 20-year old daughter, who were 12 and 16 respectively when the alleged screenshot was taken, continues. We are following it under the heading Elektra v. Santangelo II.

Commentary & discussion:

(English language:)
p2pnet
p2pnet
TechDirt
digg
Associated Press
Digital Music News
Slyck
Digital Music Weblog
Reductive
Crunch Gear
BroadbandReports.com
Blogger News Network
MP3 Newswire
boing boing

(Other languages:)
Gulli

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

9 comments:

CodeWarrior said...

I can only agree 100 percent with Alter_fritz.

AMEN!
~Code

raybeckerman said...

That's why they're trying to get it dismissed "without prejudice", in an attempt to avoid liability for attorneys fees.

raybeckerman said...

alter_fritz, I would prefer for you to take out the "gunowning" part. Lawlessness is their game, not mine.

raybeckerman said...

Dear alter_fritz

I'm sorry to have deleted your posts as you are an insightful reader and a welcome contributor.

But there is nothing Mr. Gabriel would like better than to see remarks like those two which you posted today.

So don't help him out like that.

BasicTek said...

"On April 1 1,2004, defendant was found distributing the 1,322 sound recordings found on Exhibit B"

I thought it was established that the defendant was NOT the one found distributing. How can they make this statement?

"Nonetheless, plaintiffs were initially willing to settle this case for an amount well below their actual damages"

Here we go with the fake damages numbers again. How can they make statements like this to a judge. Isn't that purgery or something? Downloads do not = lost sales, billions are not being lost to P2P, in fact P2P is likely increasing sales since P2P users are usually found to buy much more music than non P2P users.

"Rather than taking responsibility for her actions and those of her family, however, defendant chose to take her case to the mass media."

So this makes the assumption that A) the family is guilty and B) Patti knew all along. By blaming her family they now contradict the earlier quote where they blamed her the defendant.

"Ultimately, the depositions of defendant, her oldest children, and her former neighbor, which depositions took place between April and June 2006, proved plaintiffs to have been right all along."

For the plaintiffs to be right all along would mean that Patti was guilty (which is obviously not true or they wouldn't be dropping her case). How can they lie like this?

"Moreover, both defendant and Michelle Santangelo testified that defendant had instructed Michelle Santangelo not to create a list of people who had used defendant's computer, even though Michelle Santangelo had offered to do so and even though plaintiffs had specifically requested this information, because, upon information and belief, defendant did not believe that it was appropriate for plaintiffs to take legal action against teenagers who violate plaintiffs' rights."

Big question... Is it legal for a billion dollar corporation to sue innocent people and force their children to make a list of their friends (other children) for the RIAA to target in other lawsuits? Is that what our judicial system is about?

raybeckerman said...

Dear basictek,

All good points.

Hopefully Jordan Glass will give them hell in his opposition papers.

Anonymous said...

Quote from the pdf:
Show on NBC that same day, defendant falsely stated, "And the recording industry has no problem suing a 12-year old".

RIAA says that it is not true that they sue children. Then they sue children.

Alter_Fritz said...

Deluce
what Patti might have meant back then with that "no Proplem to sue little kids" is that RIAA have NO moral scruples/problems to do that.

RIAA Richard is looking at the "Problem" from the legal POV.
Of course they have problems to sue children!

You might want to take a look for example at this older case where [i think it was RIAA-Krichbaum] failed to do what the judge ordered the RIAA to do with respect to this "guardian ad ..."-thingy.

Alter_Fritz said...

P.S. Me wonders how this will handled now since Bobby was around 12-13 at the time the RIAA accuses him to have commited copyrightinfringements and he is NOW at the time of suing him still a minor?
Must not the judge in "Santangelo II" make sure now he has this guradian thingy?