It seems to me that the American legal system as of late has been going for the gold in the disappointment olympics. The rage-inducing news today is that the Department of Justice now is coming out in support of the recent verdict against Jammie Thomas-Rasset, a single mom from Minnesota who, after being sued by the RIAA, was ordered to pay $1.92 million in damages.
During the Bush administration, this is something I might have expected. Back in 2007, that incarnation of the DoJ put out a brief stating that “Congress has crafted a statute that serves as a deterrent to those infringing parties who think they will go undetected in committing this great public wrong.” But the Bush administration was all about ignoring due process and the United States Constitution.
I’m very disappointed to see that President Obama’s DoJ seems to be taking the same ridiculous side that Bush and co took. This recent legal brief claims that the anti-piracy laws are constitutional. Specifically, the claim is that the high fines under the law are in line with the concept of due process, and that we need harsh laws to deter piracy.
Let’s examine just where we stand legally on those claims. First off, there is no way in hell that a $1.92 million fee for sharing 24 songs online can be seen as reasonable. Part of the concept of modern legal systems is that the punishment should fit the crime. Even though the suit against Jammie was not a criminal trial, it makes sense that the fines she has to pay have something to do with the damage her actions caused the plaintiffs. Do you think the companies represented by the RIAA lost almost $2 million because one woman made 24 songs available to download via P2P?
Now onto the “deterring” aspect of the law. According to a 2006 Supreme Court case, a jury cannot award damages for the “express purpose” of deterring third-parties. This is a little tricky to think about in how it pertains to Jammie’s case. On the one hand, it’s unlikely that the jurors decided to fine Jammie $80,000 per song to make her serve as an example to other music pirates. On the other hand, it’s pretty easy to argue that the law itself forces jurors to set ridiculously high fines, and the purpose of those is to scare third-parties. So even if the jury did not pick that $80,000 number because they wanted to frightened would-be filesharers, their decision certainly had that effect.
Again, it’s hard for me to state just how disappointed I am in Obama’s DoJ. Barack Obama was a professor of constitutional law at the University of Chicago, so I expect much better from anyone who associates with him. A good part of the American Constitution exists to protect people from those more powerful, whether that’s the government or other private entities. By standing up for a $1.92 million verdict against a filesharer, Obama’s people have spat on the Constitution.
