Tuesday, November 28, 2006

Ms. Lindor seeks more time to conduct hard drive depositions; RIAA says no, unless it can have extension too

In UMG v. Lindor, Ms. Lindor has asked for an extension of time in which to conduct the interrogatories and depositions of plaintiffs' hard drive experts, due to the RIAA's delay in producing the hard drive report:

November 28, 2006, Letter of Ray Beckerman (Hard Drive Deposition Deadline)*
Attachment (Copy of August 3, 2006, Order)*

The RIAA opposed it unless they too could have an extension of the discovery cutoff to enable them to subpoena the computers of Ms. Lindor's son and nephew.

November 28, 2006, Letter of Richard L. Gabriel Requesting Mutual Extension of Discovery Cutoff*

Ms. Lindor opposed the RIAA's request for an extension of its own discovery cutoff:

November 28, 2006, Letter of Ray Beckerman Responding to RIAA Request*

* 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

6 comments:

Alter_Fritz said...

http://www.ilrweb.com/viewILRPDF.asp?filename=umg_lindor_061128RBtoMagisHardDriveDeposDeadlineExA060803order

thats the right one I guess :-)

raybeckerman said...

Thanks, alter, I fixed the broken link. Sorry about that.

Alter_Fritz said...

to sum up Richies letter:

The plaintiffs are morons with regards to technology if they believe that a harddrive is attached to an internet account! So that claim in his letter is BS.

Harddrives are attached to computers.

plaintiffs are suffering of multiple personality disorder if they believe that two (2) persons (here: Gustav and Woody) can have one (1) harddrive at the same time.

As I was speculating earlier; Maybe Mr President Bush has the "hard drive that was attached to defendant's Internet account."
Hey RIAA-Richard make sure to choose next time a process server that knows the differences between apartment, private house and oval office.
I assume your clients know the address!

jaded said...

In Gabriel's letter, he states that the court was now aware that 'plaintiffs believe that defendant produced a hard drive different from the hard drive that was attached to her Internet account at the time plaintiffs detected the infringement at issue.' The letter goes on to indicate that they suspected this in early Oct and started pursuing Mrs. Lindor's son and nephew at that time.

Several questions:

Back when you were having your e-mail debate with Gabriel regarding their expert's analysis of the hard drive, did they provide any indication that they knew that there would be none because they suspected that it was not the original drive? If not, then this is simply more RIAA jerking around (and, unfortunately, provides additional ammunition for those that think lawyers sometimes are less than honorable).

Why do the plaintiffs only 'believe' that the drive is not the original? Is there something material that they've found that would indicate such (e.g., the date of some of the OS folders is after the data of the alleged infringement) or is it simply the fact that there might not be a copy of Kazaa on it and no evidence of it ever having been installed? How did they come to this conclusion if they have not actually 'inspected' the drive?

If the drive provided by Mrs. Lindor is NOT the drive that was in the computer connected to the internet (hard drives are OBVIOUSLY NOT connected to the internet!) on that fateful day many moons ago, would that not be grounds for comtempt? If they had proof of such, would they not immediately so advise the court so that appropriate action could be taken?

I would think that the plaintiffs would HAVE to have provided some sort of evidence to the court regarding their suspicions in order to obtain a subpoena for her son. Is this information available since it didn't show up in the subpoena? Or, is the bar so low that all they have to do is say that they suspect such and request a subpoena trying to get more information? If so, where does it end? [Let's say that Mrs. Lindor's son does provide some drives and an MP3 player and the RIAA can't find anything of note. Can they then subpoena all of his financial records to find out what drives/MP3 players he may have purchased and then ask him to account for each and every one?]

Enquiring minds really would like to know what evidence the plaintiffs have provided that leads to the belief that the drive that they have is an imposter.

raybeckerman said...

Dear jaded,

They have no evidence.

And they lack the integrity to admit they have no evidence.

RIAA Richard, who is the supervisor of all the cases nationwide, seems to be spending an awful lot of time on UMG v. Lindor.

All to nail a middle aged woman who works as a home health aide and who has never even used a computer.

Strange. Very strange. I think Mr. Richard has lost his way.

Ray

Alter_Fritz said...

Ray,
as you pointed out to the judge it's now 109 days (and counting) since the plaintiffs got their requested mirrorimage .
Judge Levy ordered that the inspection shall be done within a timeframe of 30 days in his August ruling.
Plaintiffs admitted that they have made the inspection already but that "they do not believe that it would make sense for them to serve [this report(s)]. (Gabriel's admitting of this fact in Nov. 28 letter, page 1 last paragraph)

Hello! Anybody at home in the plaintiffs and their lawyers offices? What do they think they are doing here?!

The judge didn't rule: "make your inspection, and if you don't like the results of your own expert(s), or if you think the results make no sense in your favour then forget my ruling and keep the results for your eyes only, not for the court nor the defendant and keep on in wasting my valuable courttime with your fishing for all the harddrives in the world."

I can't believe that RIAA-Richard and the plaintiffs can give the finger to the judge a la: "screw you judge, we are THE RIAA, and if we don't like our own experts report so we don't give it to you tiny judge, We are RIAA, we decide what to do, not you judge in this case!"

Of course Mr. Gabriel did not used exactly these words but the meaning result of his letter is the same.

So tell me, can they do it? Can they Really get away with this kind of attitude towards the US justice system?
Can't the Judge order them to hand over the results of the more then 100 days inspection time and then imprison some Label CEO's and their lawyers if the refuse to hand over the report?

If citizen journalist/bloggers * can go to jail for refusing to hand over some raw video footage why not the RIAAguys for refusing to hand over raw expert report data? Same justice for all or what?

* http://joshwolf.net/