Judge Slashes “Unconstitutional” $675,000 Damages in File-Sharing Case

In the US, there have been only two file-sharing cases involving individuals that have actually gone to court. In both of these cases, the individuals were found guilty of copyright infringement and were ordered to pay ridiculously high statutory damages to the music industry. Now, in both cases, the judges have lowered those damages significantly.

In the case of student Joel Tenenbaum, the jury initially awarded damages amounting to $675,000, or $22,500 per infringement. The damages were in line with what the laws in the country allow, but were seen as greatly excessive by everyone following the case, except for the pro-copyright groups obviously.

Now District Judge Nancy Gertner, which presided over the case, has lowered the damages awarded by the jury by 90 percent to $67,500, coming in at $2,250 per song. That’s not a small figure by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s still a significant reduction. She believed that the jury went out of line with the nature of the actual ‘crime.’

What’s more, she made it clear that she would have awarded much lower damages in the first place, lower than the reduced ones as well, if the task had not fallen to the jury. She also states that she would have lowered the damages even more, if it were permitted by the law.

“There is no question that this reduced award is still severe, even harsh. It not only adequately compensates the plaintiffs for the relatively minor harm that Tenenbaum caused them; it sends a strong message that those who exploit peer-to-peer networks to unlawfully download and distribute copyrighted works run the risk of incurring substantial damages awards,” Judge Gertner wrote in the final ruling [PDF].

“Reducing the jury’s $675,000 award, however, also sends another no less important message: The Due Process Clause does not merely protect large corporations, like BMW and State Farm, from grossly excessive punitive awards. It also protects ordinary people like Joel Tenenbaum,” she added. [via TorrentFreak]