RIAA Goes Judge Shopping After One Judge Actually Pushes Back

from the sneaky,-sneaky,-sneaky dept

The RIAA has been known to pull all sorts of tricks over the years to get what it wants, but this latest one may be the most sneaky of all. Last week, Ray Beckermann was notified that the RIAA was dropping one of the cases it had filed against one of his clients, Warner v. Cassin. In that case, a judge had been reviewing a dismissal motion, and appeared to find Beckermann's argument that "making available isn't distribution" compelling. So, perhaps it wasn't a huge surprise that the RIAA dropped the case before they lost it. But, then, a day later, Beckermann discovered that the RIAA had refiled the identical case in the same court, but rather than using the defendant's name, Cassin, it had filed it under a John Doe complaint, as if they didn't know who the defendant was. As such, the case got handed to a new judge. Basically, it appears that the RIAA didn't like where one judge was heading with the case, so got it dismissed and immediately refiled the case (potentially under false pretenses) and had it handed to another judge. Beckermann, of course, has made all of this clear to both judges -- but it seems incredibly sneaky that the RIAA would even think to go that far. Hopefully the court recognizes this judge shopping for what it is.

Filed Under: cassin, judge shopping, making available, ray beckermann, riaa
Companies: riaa, warner music