Bit Parts

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit upheld sanctions against John Deep for failure to shut down his Aimster peer-to-peer file-sharing network. In Re: Aimster Copyright Litigation, 03-2188. The district court had issued an injunction ordering Deep to either block infringing uses or stop operating Aimster pending resolution of the music industry's copyright infringement suit against the service. The Seventh Circuit affirmed. But the district court fined Deep $5000 and ordered him to pay more than $100,000 of the plaintiffs' attorney fees for violating the injunction. In its latest ruling, the Seventh Circuit noted that Deep “admitted in the district court that, since he was unable (he claimed) to block infringing uses, he had to shut his service down. He did not do so. The excuses he offers for his contumacy are unpersuasive, indeed frivolous. As the plaintiffs point out, he has engaged in vexatious litigation in several courts in an effort to avoid complying with the injunction, as well as skipping hearings in the district court and engaging in a variety of stall tactics.” Only a few days before the Seventh Circuit affirmed the sanctions, the U.S. Supreme Court denied Deep's petition for a writ of certiorari from relief from the injunction. Deep v. Recording Industry Association, 03-658. 

'Peacemaker' Ruling