Apparently not satisfied with civil claims against earthbound mortals, the RIAA has taken to suing the dead. In one of the latest batch of lawsuits, the complaint named the recently deceased Gertrude Walton as sole defendant. She stands (or, perhaps, rests) accused of sharing over 700 songs owned by member publishers via peer-to-peer networks:
‘More than a month after Walton was buried in Beckley, a group of record companies named her as the only defendant in a federal lawsuit. They claimed Walton made more than 700 pop, rock and rap songs available for free on the Internet under the screen name “smittenedkitten.”
On Thursday, a spokesman for the Recording Industry Association of America acknowledged that Walton was probably not the smittenedkitten it is searching for.’
What’s most surprising about this is not that the defendant lacks a computer (after all, the RIAA has accused computer-illiterate grandmothers of sharing copyrighted rap music before) or, indeed, an existence; instead, what I find peculiarly perplexing is that their lawyers continue to rely on automated detection processes to identify defendants; further, they appear not to have performed adequate background research into potential defendants (eg, to ascertain whether they’re still alive) — despite their recent pledge to do so.
I suppose one can forgive the occasional slip when several thousand defendants are routinely the subjects of litigation. However, the slip is less forgiveable in light of the RIAA’s track record in these matters — which includes such notable actions as RIAA v Lahara (claim against a 13-year-old student) and RIAA v Ward (claim against a Macintosh-using grandmother).
