Quote:
Originally Posted by valo403
There is without a doubt not an ounce of an 8th Amendment issue here. She was facing fines of up to $150,000 per violation, the only reason a second trial even occurred was an incorrect jury instruction. The second trial was valid, at least at this point as appeals haven't been filed, and the decision of the jury is well within the allowable range. Nothing violative of the 8th Amendment there at all.
That said, I think it's ridiculous that the RIAA has pursued this suit. I'm not sure what they hope to gain, associating your artists with multi-million dollar suits against working class families is hardly good press. Apparently the labels have stopped suing individuals and have focused their efforts on ISP's, why this case didn't stay out of court is pretty odd. There's a decent chance that the defendant's attorney screwed this one by not accepting an earlier settlement offer. I'm still not a fan of the rigidity that the RIAA has shown in approaching this problem.
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When the songs costs .99 cents online to download, there's nothing stating she distributed them to anyone else, how is being fined $1.9M dollar for 24 digital songs NOT excessive? Honestly, I am curious.