DULUTH, Minnesota -- Jammie Thomas, a single mother of two, was
found liable Thursday for copyright infringement in the nation's
first file-sharing case to go before a jury.
Twelve jurors here said the Minnesota woman must pay $9,250 for
each of 24 shared songs that were the subject of the lawsuit,
amounting to $222,000 in penalties.
They could have dinged her for up to $3.6 million in damages, or
awarded as little as $18,000. She was found liable for infringing
songs from bands such as Journey, Green Day, AFI, Aerosmith and
others.
After the verdict was read, Thomas and her attorney left the
courthouse without comment. The jurors also declined to talk to
reporters.
The verdict, coming after two days of testimony and about five
hours of deliberations, was a mixed victory for the RIAA, which has
brought more than 20,000 lawsuits in the last four years as part of
its zero-tolerance policy against pirating. The outcome is likely
to embolden the RIAA, which began targeting individuals in lawsuits
after concluding the legal system could not keep pace with the ever
growing number of file-sharing sites and services.
"This is what can happen if you don't settle," RIAA attorney
Richard Gabriel told reporters outside the courthouse. "I think we
have sent a message we are willing to go to trial."
Still, it's unlikely the RIAA's courtroom victory will translate
into a financial windfall or stop piracy, which the industry claims
costs it billions in lost sales. Despite the thousands of lawsuits
-- the majority of them settling while others have been dismissed
or are pending -- the RIAA's litigation war on internet piracy has
neither dented illegal, peer-to-peer file sharing or put much fear
in the hearts of music swappers.
According to BigChampagne, an online measuring service, the number
of peer-to-peer users unlawfully trading goods has nearly tripled
since 2003, when the RIAA began legal onslaught targeting
individuals.
At the time, BigChampagne says, there were about 3.8 million file
sharers trading over the internet at a given moment. Now, the group
has measured a record 9 million users trading at the same time.
Roughly 70 percent of trading involves digital music, according to
BigChampagne.
The case, however, did set legal precedents favoring the
industry.
In proving liability, the industry did not have to demonstrate that
the defendant's computer had a file-sharing program installed at
the time that they inspected her hard drive. And the RIAA did not
have to show that the defendant was at the keyboard when RIAA
investigators accessed Thomas' share folder.
Also, the judge in the case ruled that jurors may find copyright
infringement liability against somebody solely for sharing files on
the internet. The RIAA did not have to prove that others downloaded
the files. That was a big bone of contention that U.S. District
Judge Michael Davis settled in favor of the industry.
Thomas, 30, maintained that she was not the Kazaa user
"Tereastarr," whose files were detected by RIAA's investigators.
Her attorney speculated to jurors that she could have been the
victim of a spoof, cracker, zombie, drone and other attacks.
The jury found her liable after receiving evidence her internet
protocol address and cable modem identifier were used to share some
1,700 files. The hard drive linked to Kazaa on Feb. 21, 2005 -- the
evening in question -- did not become evidence in the case.
According to testimony, Thomas replaced her hard drive weeks after
RIAA investigators accessed her share file and discovered 1,702
files. The industry sued on just 24 of those files.
(Courtroom sketch: Wired News/ Cate Whittemore)
