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Retrial Date Set in RIAA v. Thomas

By Ryan Singel, Kevin Poulsen, Sarah Lai Stirland, Kim Zetter, and David Kravets

A federal judge tentatively has set(.pdf) a March 9 retrial date in the Jammie Thomas music file sharing case. Of about 30,000 casesthe Recording Industry Association of America has lodged against peer-to-peer users, the Thomas case was the first and only one to go to trial.

After a four-day trial last year, a Duluth, Minnesota, federal jury found Thomas liable of copyright infringement and dinged her $222,000 for 24 songs she was sharing on the Kazaa network. But last month, U.S. District Judge Michael Davis, who presided over the case, declareda mistrial.

His decision meant that the RIAA's 5-year-old copyright infringement litigation campaign has never been successful at trial. Davis' decision focused at the heart of all file sharing cases: What level of proof was necessary for the RIAA to prevail ? a question still unansweredfive years after the RIAA's litigation campaign commenced.

Davis had instructed the jury last year that the recording industry did not have to prove anybody downloaded the songs from Thomas' open Kazaa share folder. Davis read Jury Instruction No. 15 to jurors saying they could find unauthorized distribution ? copyright infringement ? if Thomas was "making copyrighted sound recordings available" over a peer-to-peer network "regardless of whether actual distribution has been shown."

Still, there's no guarantee of a trial. The RIAA is requesting the judge's permission to appeal his mistrial order. The judge has not ruled on that motion(.pdf).

The RIAA, which is the music industry's lobbying and litigation arm, told the judge that copyright infringement on peer-to-peer networks is implied, and that it shouldn't have to provide proof of an actual transfer of music files to other users ? because it's impossible(.pdf).

Image: Modernhumorist.com

Full post as published by Threat Level on October 30, 2008 (boomark / email).