Yet another example of the Obama Justice Department doing just what one would have expected from the Bush Justice Department:
The Obama administration is set to urge a federal appeals court to reinstate a $1.5 million music filing-sharing verdict a jury levied against a Minnesota woman for sharing two dozen songs on Kazaa.
At issue is a Minnesota federal judge’s decision last year lowering the verdict to $54,000, ruling that the jury’s award “for stealing 24 songs for personal use is appalling”.
The case tests the constitutionality of the Copyright Act, which allows penalties of as much as $150,000 per infringement. It also asks whether federal judges have the power to reduce copyright damage awards rendered by juries.
(via Wired)
Generally speaking, the Justice Department has the obligation to defend the constitutionality of a statute, but that doesn’t mean it has to take the position it’s taking in this case. All of a piece with the generally dismal performance of the Obama Justice Department.
This is what comes when people get to make their own laws; or, more properly, when corporations get to make their own laws. When the rest of us are damaged, we have to prove the amount by which we have been damaged. Corporations get to pass laws that set damage amounts wildly out of proportion to any actual harm. There can be no doubt that the Supreme Court that has so assiduously sought to limit the amount of punitive damages regular people can get from corporations will have no trouble defending the rights of corporations to awards totally out of proportion to the damages they have suffered. Funny too, that the Congresses that have passed laws like this are stuffed chockablock with legislators that advocate “tort reform”, which translates into limitations of damages awards against corporate America.
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