Counterfeit Law Blog

For what appears to be the first time, a federal judge in Oklahoma has ordered the plaintiff recording companies in a music piracy case to pay a defendant's attorney's fees.  The July 16, 2007 ruling required the companies to pay Deborah Foster attorney's fees in the amount of $68,685.23.

Ms. Foster  was sued in 2004 after being identified as the owner of an Internet account that had been used to illegally download pirated music.  Ms. Foster steadfastly maintained that she had never illegally downloaded music.  Although she apparently acknowledged that the downloading "may" have been done by her daughter or husband, Ms. Foster never unequivocally identified the perpetrator.  Eventually, the recording companies voluntarily dismissed their lawsuit against her.   Ms. Foster then moved for attorney's fees.  Last February, asserting that the recording companies "failed to allege any facts in their Complaint that would support Ms. Foster's secondary copyright infringement liability," that the Complaint was devoid of facts that could support a finding of direct liability, and that the plaintiffs had "initiated the secondary liability claims to press Ms. Foster into settlement after they had ceased to believe she was a direct or 'primary' infringer," the court granted Ms. Foster's motion for attorney's fees. Its ruling this month set the amount of the fees to be paid.

According to Variety, the RIAA has issued a statement saying, "We respectfully believe that this ruling is in error and is an isolated occurrence. Our interest in these cases is enforcing the rights of the record companies and artists, while fostering an online environment where the legal marketplace can flourish and the music industry can invest in the new bands of tomorrow. In the handful of cases where the person engaging in the illegal activity in the household is not the person responsible for the ISP account, we look to gather the facts quickly and do our best to identify the appropriate defendant."