Earlier we reported on the odd chain of events and outcome of the most recent ACS:Law court date on Monday. Now there are even more details surfacing from the events that transpired in the courtroom.
Consumer group BeingThreatened.com, who was present at Monday’s hearing in support of the defendants, relayed their courtroom experience to TorrentFreak later that day.
Much confusion took place during the hearing, and stemmed from MediaCAT’s last-minute attempt to drop the file-sharing cases that their partner, ACS:Law, had brought against the defendants. However, it turned out that MediaCAT did not actually hold the copyrights to the films they had attempted to collect payment on, and ACS:Law has expressed their intention to re-file the claims after correcting the numerous errors the judge has previously brought to their attention.
Judge Birss QC noted that five of the of the demand letter recipients had already filed defenses, and said that he was “astonished” at the ACS:Law’s intent to refile. He went on to describe the situation as “unprecedented in his personal experience and career at the bar.”
“MediaCAT’s attempt to discontinue all twenty-seven cases and pay costs to the defendants shows how fundamental ACS:Law now consider the problems in these claims,” BeingThreatened.com spokesperson James Bench told TorrentFreak.
“It has been clear since the speculative invoicing scheme first made an unwelcome appearance in this country, that there were massive and fatal flaws in the model,” Bench continued. “It does not provide a solution to copyright infringement, it is apparent that the evidence is untrustworthy and the laws and precedent which ACS:Law believe underpin its work do not support their position. It is good news that Judge Birss has seen fit to put this practice under the spotlight and expose it for the unsupportable and flawed legal shambles it is.”
Judge Birss is expecting that two more sessions will be required to deal with the mess that ACS:Law has made, the next scheduled for January 24th. On the agenda for those sessions will be dealing with issues of MediaCAT’s contract with the copyright holder, and how much in “wasted costs” the defendant’s should be entitled to collect from ACS:Law. This should indeed be entertaining.
