In cases of this type, lawyers procure the copyright to pornographic films and then go through the courts to demand money from people who have downloaded them. US District Judge G Patrick Murphy called the process 'abusive litigation' and ordered three lawyers to pay US$261,025 in fees and costs to a Missouri man.
Plunder
The three lawyers who sued him are Paul Duffy of Chicago-based Prenda Law, John L Steele of Chicago-based Steele Hansmeier and Paul Hansmeier of Minnesota-based Alpha Law Firm. In a similar judgement in California earlier this year, US District Judge Otis Wright II said: 'So now, copyright laws originally designed to compensate starving artists allow starving attorneys in this electronic-media era to plunder the citizenry.' Source: St Louis Post-Dispatch
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