Intellectual Property Law

Supreme Court Gets RIAA Copyright Case

By David Kravets

Whitney Harper was sued by the RIAA, when she was a teen.

A case testing the meaning of the so-called “innocent infringer’s” defense to the Copyright Act’s minimum $750-per-music-track fine has landed at the U.S. Supreme Court.

The case the justices were asked to review Wednesday concerns a federal appeals court’s February decision ordering a university student to pay the Recording Industry Association of America $27,750 ($750 a track) for file sharing 37 songs when she was a high school cheerleader. That decision reversed a Texas federal judge who had ordered defendant Whitney Harper to pay $7,400 ($200 per song).

The lower court, without a trial, had granted her the innocent infringer’s exemption to the Copyright Act’s minimum fine, because the teen claimed she didn’t know she was violating copyrights. She said she thought file sharing was akin to internet radio streaming.

The appeals court, however, said she was not eligible for such a defense, even though she was between 14 and 16 years old when the infringing activity occurred on LimeWire. The reason, the court concluded, is that the Copyright Act precludes such a defense if the legitimate CDs of the music in question carry copyright notices.

“Harper cannot rely on her purported legal naivety,” the New Orleans?based appeals court ruled, 3-0.

But attorneys for Harper told the justices that she should get the benefit of the $200 innocent-infringer fine, because the digital files in question contained no copyright notice.

“Only notice on the copy that the infringer used to infringe tends to disprove the infringer’s innocence,” attorney Kiwi Camara told the high court in a petition.

Hollywood attorney and copyright blogger Ben Sheffner suggested the justices would not likely buy Camara’s legal theory, because it would give copyright scofflaws  an easy pass on being held liable.

The justices have the option of taking the case and issuing a ruling, or declining to hear it altogether.

See Also:

• $675000 RIAA File Sharing Verdict Is ‘Unreasonable’
• Anti-RIAA Site Folds
• Copyright Lawsuits Plummet in Aftermath of RIAA Campaign
• LimeWire Crushed in RIAA Infringement Lawsuit
• Settlement Rejected in ‘Shocking’ RIAA File Sharing Verdict
• Authors Guild: ‘To RIAA or Not to RIAA’
• File Sharing Lawsuits at a Crossroads

Full post as published by Threat Level on May 27, 2010 (boomark / email).