RIAA Fights to Avoid Attorney Fees
Found on Wired on Thursday, 18 October 2007
The music-industry lobbying-and-litigation arm is protesting a federal magistrate's recommendation that it cough up hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees for an Oregon woman.
The RIAA dropped the case this summer against Andersen, months after concluding her hard drive didn't contain any purloined music tracks.
The RIAA is arguing in court documents that the association shouldn't have to pay defense counsel fees, because Andersen is probably guilty anyway.
Patton wrote in court records that the RIAA dropped the Andersen case because "the computer inspection was inconsistent and inconclusive insofar as digital evidence of the infringing sound recordings could not be found."
So in short, they sued a woman, failed to provide any evidence, even admitted that they found no evidence and now want to leave her with the legal fees? How nice of them. Besides, in a modern legal system, you have to deliver proof; just claiming someone is probably guilty won't do, even though that's how the RIAA think it's done.