Saturday, December 27, 2008

RIAA's motion for interlocutory appeal in Capitol Records v. Thomas denied

In Capitol Records v. Thomas, the RIAA's motion for permission to appeal from the Court's September 24, 2008, decision setting aside the jury verdict has been denied.

District Judge Michael J. Davis ruled that there was "no substantial ground for a difference of opinion" on the question of law presented, and that granting permission for the appeal would not "materially advance the ultimate termination of the litigation".

Judge Davis noted that even "[i]f the Eighth Circuit holds that Jury Instruction No. 15 was a correct statement of the law, this Court must still address the constitutionality of the damages award and the possibility of a retrial remains." Judge Davis has previously observed that "the damages awarded in this case are wholly disproportionate to the damages suffered by Plaintiffs."

December 23, 2008, Decision of Hon. Michael J. Davis, denying RIAA motion to certification of interlocutory appeal

[Ed. note. For you non-lawyers out there: (a) in federal practice, only final judgments are normally appealable; (b) for an order in a federal case to be appealable, the trial court first has to "certify" the order for an "interlocutory" appeal; (c) if the trial court certified it for an appeal, then the appeals court would decide whether it is appealable. Here the trial court has denied the request for certification, so the RIAA's request for an appeal is over. -R.B.]

Commentary & discussion:

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gulli (German)
The Register
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Keywords: lawyer digital copyright law online internet law legal download upload peer to peer p2p file sharing filesharing music movies indie independent label freeculture creative commons pop/rock artists riaa independent mp3 cd favorite songs intellectual property portable music player

5 comments:

Another Kevin said...

So, for the benefit of a dumb engineer who isn't familiar with creative abuses of civil procedure, what's the RIAA's likely next move? A petition for rehearing en banc of the interlocutory appeal? (I assume that the RIAA will continue to use every dilatory tactic available.)

Anonymous said...

I agree with you Kevin, that the RIAA will try every underhanded, sneaky tactic that they can.

But, I believe that Judge Davis is actually following the letter of the law and he will only allow so many shenanigans from these jerks until he comes down hard on them.

I just hope that he has reached the end of his patience with these scum.

Anonymous said...

I think this is very likely going to be the last thing we hear about before the RIAA member companies in this case figure out a way to dismiss/get out of this case.

First of all, the person whom they went after makes them look very much like the bully that I think that they are.

Second, the District Judge has made it clear that they MUST prove the distribution of COPIES or PHONORECORDS by the Defendant in order to prevail in this case. The Judge made it clear in his order that the National Car Rental case is binding on the Court and that the Court and the RIAA have NO wiggle room in regard to that matter. This means the Jury Instructions will clearly reflect National Car Rental, which is very bad for the Plaintiffs.

Since they do not possess any evidence that the DEFENDANT distributed COPIES or PHONORECORDS to anyone other than their agent, and whatever limited evidence they do have does not tie the DEFENDANT to such distribution to the exclusion of any other person, including other family members and others, they have a problem.

Since the Odds of a Plaintiff win is not good for them this time with the instructions that will be given to the Jury during a second trial, my guess is that they will find some excuse to cut and run.......

Albert

Alter_Fritz said...

Ray wrote: [Ed. note. For you non-lawyers out there:[...]

Thanks for that one.
While it does not make Sony-BMG, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Warner's Lawyers proceedings before your courts more believable("Unbelieveable!")you Editor's notes do still help to put their behaviour in context to understand.

Not Telling said...

It's not over. They will introduce motion for interlocutory appeal of decision denying RIAA motion to certification of interlocutory appeal.