Virgin Records America, Inc v. Thomas

Filing 7

Virgin Records America, Inc v. Thomas

Doc. 7

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT DISTRICT OF MINNESOTA ******************* VIRGIN RECORDS AMERICA, INC., et al., Plaint iffs, Civ. No. 06-1497 (MJD/RLE) vs. JAMMIE THOMAS, Defendant. ******************* PLAINTIFFS'STATEMENT OF THE CASE Background Plaint iffs are recording companies who own or control exclusive rights to copyrights in sound recordings. Collectively, Plaintiffs face a massive problem of digital piracy over the Internet. Every month, copyright infringers unlawfully disseminate billions of perfect digital copies of Plaintiffs'copyrighted sound recordings over peer-to-peer (" 2P" networks. See Levi P ) Grossman, It' All Free, Time, May 5, 2003. Indeed, the Supreme Court recently characterized s the magnitude of online piracy as "nfringement on a gigantic scale."See Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer i Studios, Inc., v. Grokster Ltd., et al., 125 S. Ct. 2764, 2782 (2005). Defendant is an individual residing in this District who Plaintiffs allege engaged in online copyright infringement using the " azaa"P2P network. K This Dispute On February 21, 2005, investigators located an individual with the screen name "ereastarr@KaZaA"using the Kazaa file sharing program to engage in copyright infringement. t This individual had 1702 music files on her computer and was distributing them freely to the millio ns of people who use similar peer-to-peer networks. On information and belief, this

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individual downloaded all or many of these 1702 music files without the permission of the copyright owners. In short, as an active user of the Kazaa P2P network, this individual was downloading copyrighted sounds recordings from other users of the Kazaa network, and was distribut ing copyrighted sound recordings stored on her computer to other Kazaa users. These acts constitute copyright infringement. See Grokster, 125 S. Ct. at 2770-72. The investigators, a third party known as MediaSentry, determined that this individual used Internet Protocol ("P" address 24.179.199.117 to connect to the internet. After filing a I) " oe" lawsuit against the individual using that IP address, Plaintiffs subpoenaed her internet D service provider to determine her identity. The internet service provider - Charter

Communicat ions, Inc. - identified Defendant Jammie Thomas as the individual in question. Plaint iffs filed their Complaint against Defendant Jammie Thomas in April 2006 seeking redress for the infringement of their copyrighted sound recordings pursuant to the Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. § 101 et seq. Plaintiffs claim statutory damages pursuant to 17 U.S.C. § 504(c) for Defendant's infringement of each of Plaintiffs'copyrighted recordings. Plaintiffs further claim ent it lement to their attorneys' fees and costs pursuant to 17 U.S.C. § 505. Date: July 21, 2006 Respect fully submitted, /s Laura G. Coates__________________________ Felicia J. Boyd (No. 186168) Kara L. Benson (No. 248290) Michelle A. Paninopoulos (No. 312411) Laura G. Coates (No. 350175) FAEGRE & BENSON LLP 2200 Wells Fargo Center 90 South Seventh Street Minneapo lis, Minnesota 55402-3901 Telephone: [phone] Facsimile: [phone]

OF COUNSEL David A. Tonini (pro hac vice) HOLME ROBERTS & OWEN LLP 1700 Lincoln, Suite 4100 Denver, Colorado 80203 Telephone: [phone] Facsimile: [phone] ATTORNEYS FOR PLAINTIFFS
M2:20813006.01

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