Single Mother of 4 Ordered to Pay $1.5 Million for Music Piracy

According to Billboard, a federal jury has decided that Jammie Thomas-Rasset owes $1.5 million for sharing 24 songs over the Internet. Jurors determined Wednesday, Nov. 3, that Jammie Thomas-Rasset from Minnesota owes $62,500 per song. Last year a federal jury found that Thomas-Rasset willfully violated the copyrights on the 24 songs when she used the Kazaa peer-to-peer file-sharing network to download the songs over the internet. Thomas-Rasset was ordered to pay $1.92 million in damages, or $80,000 per song. But Chief U.S. District Judge Michael Davis reduced the verdict to about $54,000 in damages, calling the jury's penalty "monstrous and shocking." With all of the people downloading songs, the Recording Industry Association of America has chosen to go after a single mother with four children. We understand the point that the RIAA is trying to make about music piracy, but the example is extreme to say the least. It has been made clear that if you do the crime, you must pay the fine.

Read more at Billboard.