Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
-The Eighth Amendment to the US Constitution
This Court finds an award of $30,000 for each defendant would be an excessive punishment considering the seriousness of each Defendant’s conduct and the sum of money at issue. Although Plaintiff contends the minimal revenue lost from each Defendant’s single transaction does not account for the extent of damages, this Court is unpersuaded that the remote damages — “downstream revenue” and destroyed plans for a sequel due, in part, to piracy — justify an award of $30,000 per defendant, even in light of the statute’s goal of deterrence. Instead, this Court finds Plaintiff has not made a showing justifying damages in excess of the statutory minimum. Accordingly, the Court, within its “wide latitude” of discretion, grants Plaintiff the minimum statutory award of $750 against D. & B. Barnett, jointly and severally and $750 against each remaining defaulted Defendant in the case.
Author: KS
The Fed Just Acknowledged Its Too Big To Jail Policy
WASHINGTON — The federal government until recently shielded big banks from criminal prosecution out of concern that convictions may damage the financial system, a top Federal Reserve official said Friday, explicitly acknowledging a policy long denied by the Obama administration.
The admission came during a tense exchange between William Dudley, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) at a Senate Banking Committee hearing meant to explore the cozy relations between federal regulators and the banks they supervise.
Until May, large financial institutions investigated for wrongdoing had dodged criminal prosecution under the Obama administration, despite evidence from federal regulators and prosecutors showing that big banks had, for instance, laundered money for suspected terrorists and drug cartels; manipulated interest rate benchmarks; rigged various commodities markets; mislead investors in mortgage-linked securities; duped homeowners into taking out expensive mortgages; manipulated municipal debt markets; and broke state and federal rules when attempting to seize homes after borrowers fell behind on their payments, a scandal that became known as “robosigning.”
When exposing a crime…
Link (9gag)FISA Judge To Yahoo: If US Citizens Don’t Know They’re Being Surveilled, There’s No Harm
If this order is enforced and it’s secret, how can you be hurt? The people don’t know that — that they’re being monitored in some way. How can you be harmed by it? I mean, what’s –what’s the — what’s your — what’s the damage to your consumer?
By the same logic, all sorts of secret surveillance would be OK — like watching your neighbor’s wife undress through the window, or placing a hidden camera in the restroom — as long as the surveilled party is never made aware of it. If you don’t know it’s happening, then there’s nothing wrong with it. Right?
“For your security”
UK’s Home Secretary Says Terrorists Will Be The Real Winners If Country’s Cell Coverage Dead Zones Are Fixed
So it’s the tired old “because terrorists” excuse again…
The UK’s culture secretary wants to eradicate the nation’s patchy cell phone coverage. UK cell phone users aren’t able to switch towers on the fly — something residents of other EU countries (as well as the US) enjoy — but are forced to connect only with their provider’s towers.
But Home Secretary Theresa May would rather UK citizens suffer through a plethora of dead zones (or “not spots” — the term of choice for these no-service areas) than put her country in harm’s way. According to an internal letter written by May, providing near-seamless coverage for UK phone users will open the door for increased terrorist activity.
Catcalling royalty
How Do You Have A Town Of 300 Residents… And 100 Police Officers?
Oakley, Michigan has only 300 residents. Up until very recently, it also had 100 police officers. How does a town end up with a police force equal to one-third of its population? To answer that question, you have to go back to when it had a single police officer.
Oakley, Mi. is barely a town at 300 people, only one streetlight and, until recently, one police officer. The one cop was good at his job, reports Vocativ’s M.L. Nestel, until he was forced to step down after getting caught stalking a teenage girl.
A new chief, Robert Reznick, was installed. He immediately began hiring new officers. The one officer that had policed the town for several years without incident was replaced with twelve full-time officers. Then Reznick went further, allowing civilians to buy their way onto the police force.
Here’s how the chief’s program works: The wanna-be officers pay about about $1,200 for a uniform, bullet-proof vest and gun, and some make additional donations to the police department. In return, they get a police badge and the right to carry their gun almost anywhere in the state, including places that people with normal gun permits can’t, like casinos, bars, stadiums and daycare centers.
This proved to be very popular, even pulling in a couple of non-resident NFL players as auxiliary officers. Needless to say, running a pay-to-play police force tends to generate problems. Complaints were raised about the heightened police presence at a local event that had run peaceably (if rather rowdily) for years.
Obama Administration Reverses Bush Policy, Says U.S. Torture Ban Applies Abroad
It seems that Obama has actually affirmed that torture is not legal, even if done outside the US, and even if done during a war. It remains to be seen if this changes anything, or if it means another loophole will be used.
In contrast to positions previously taken by the U.S. government, the delegation will affirm that U.S. obligations under Article 16, which prohibits cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment, do not apply exclusively inside the territorial United States. The delegation in Geneva will make clear, consistent with the text, negotiating history, and the Senate ratification process, that U.S. obligations under Article 16 (as well as under other provisions of the Convention with the same jurisdictional language) apply in places outside the United States that the U.S. government controls as a governmental authority. The delegation will also make clear our conclusion that the United States currently exercises such control at the U.S. Naval Station at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and over all proceedings conducted there, and with respect to U.S.-registered ships and aircraft.
Hooray For Licenses! Update Strips 17 Songs From Steam Users’ Purchased Copies Of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas
It seems like Rockstar has pushed a steam update removing 17 songs from GTA: San Andreas, because they don’t have a license to distribute them any more.
The problem with this is that customers have already paid for a license to those songs, and should not be affected by this at all. Yet, they are.
You might have noticed Steam downloading a sizeable update for Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas over the weekend and wondered what that was about. A fancy secret tying into GTA V’s return to the west coast, perhaps? Not quite. The patch added support for XInput controllers like the Xbox 360 pad, which is nice, but also removed seventeen songs from various radio stations. No more angsting out and gunning it across Gant Bridge in the wrong lane listening to Killing in the Name, I’m afraid.
Edit:
Uriel-238 writes in the comments at Techdirt:
What the patch does
-removes 18 songs
(“Critical Beatdown”, “Running Down A Dream”, “Woman To Woman”, “You Dropped A Bomb On Me”, “Yum Yum”, “Running Away”, “I Don’t Give A f*ck”, “Express Yourself”, “Killing in the Name of”, “Hellraiser”, “Ring My Bell”, “Personal Jesus”, “Don’t Let It Go To Your Head”, “Express Yourself”. “Rock Creek Park”, “Grunt”, “Soul Power ’74” and “The Payback”)
-revokes all mods created for San Andreas on PC
-deletes all of your previous save files
-removes 1280×700 resolution
-has various textures missing and things like foilage completely removedSource: Luneth’s review on the Steam Store Page