1st Cir Affirms $675,000 Jury Award For Unauthorized Downloads/Distributions

Sony BMG Music Entertainment v. Tenenbaum, No. Case: 12-2146 (1st Cir. filed 6/25/2013) [Doc. 00116547502].

From the decision:

Joel Tenenbaum illegally downloaded and distributed music for several years. A group of recording companies sued Tenenbaum, and a jury awarded damages of $675,000, representing $22,500 for each of thirty songs whose copyright Tenenbaum violated. Tenenbaum appeals the award, claiming that it is so large that it violates his constitutional right to due process of law. We hold that the award did not violate Tenenbaum's right to due process, and we affirm.

The two issues on appeal were: (1) what is the correct standard for evaluating the constitutionality of an award of statutory damages under the Copyright Act; and (2) did an award of $675,000 violate defendant's right to due process?  On issue one, the Court held that the correct standard was that announced in St. Louis, I.M. & S.Ry. Co. v. Williams, 251 U.S. 63 (1919), that a statutory damage award violates due process only "where the penalty prescribed is so severe and oppressive as to be wholly disproportionate to the offense and obviously unreasonable."  On issue two, the Court found that the award did not violate defendant's due process rights.

File Sharing Jury Award Reduced 90%

Sony BMG Music v. Tenenbaum, No. 07 Civ 11446 (D. Mass. memo and order filed July 9, 2010):

This copyright case raises the question of whether the Constitution’s Due Process Clause is violated by a jury’s award of $675,000 in statutory damages against an individual who reaped no pecuniary reward from his infringement and whose individual infringing acts caused the plaintiffs minimal harm. I hold that it is.

Joel Tenenbaum (“Tenenbaum”), the defendant in this action, was accused of using file- sharing software to download and distribute thirty copyrighted songs belonging to the plaintiffs. The plaintiffs are a group of the country’s biggest recording companies. Their lawsuit against Tenenbaum is one of thousands that they have brought against file sharers throughout the country. Tenenbaum, like many of the defendants in these suits, was an undergraduate when his file- sharing was detected.

Labels Request to Inspect Home Computers Denied

Sony BMG Music Entertainment v. Tenenbaum, No. 08-MC-00104, 2009 BL 124443 (D.R.I. June 10, 2009).

Court denied various record labels' request to inspect and mirror image the home computer the parents of a defendant in a music downloading copyright infringement action pending in another district court.

Related action against son in another district: Capitol Records, Inc. v. Alaujan, No. 03-CV-

11661 [D. Mass. (i) May 6, 2009 order permitting labels to miror one of defendant's two computers; (ii) May 13, 2009 order that “reminded” the record companies that the Massachusetts lawsuit was “‘not an opportunity to explore any potential copyright infringement committed by [the son] at any time or place’ and that ‘relevant discovery [is] limited to

the infringement of specific songs whose copyrights were owned or licensed by the [record companies] and which were identified in Exhibits A or B to their Complaint.")

In the Rhode Island action, the record labels sought to inspect and mirror Tenenbaum’s parents’ home computer. The parents were not parties to the Massachusetts dispute involving their adult son. Additionally, the parents bought their computer after their son left for college. The court found that although it was possible that the computer contained some evidence relevant to their son's file sharing activities, the record companies had not “shown enough of a likelihood

of relevant evidence to warrant the intrusion of privacy arising out of a forensic computer analysis of a home computer utilized for years by non-parties to the underlying case.” Further, the Mass. court had granted the record companies permission to analyze the son's computer, and thus, the record companies’ request to search for similar information on his parents

computer would be “duplicative and invasive of [the parents’] independent privacy interests as non-parties.” Nor would denial of the motion “handcuff” plaintiff record companies’ ability to litigate the underlying copyright infringement claim: the son had also admitted to downloading music, and the record companies obtained records from the file-sharing service that were attributed to the son's user name/IP address.

Record companies’ motion to compel denied.