INTERESTING NEW FROM VARIOUS NEWS MEDIA

Photo:J. Kevin Fitzsimons for The New York Times






Media News - Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Pirate Bay copyright test case begins

A copyright test case involving one of the world's biggest free file-sharing websites that could help music and film companies recoup millions of dollars in lost revenues started on Monday in Stockholm. Four men linked to The Pirate Bay were charged early last year by a Swedish prosecutor with conspiracy to break copyright law and related offences. Companies including Warner Bros., MGM, Columbia Pictures, 20th Century Fox Films, Sony BMG, Universal and EMI are also asking for damages of more than SEK 100m (EUR 9,2m) to cover lost revenues. Sites like The Pirate Bay allow people to download songs, movies and computer games without paying and the trial is being closely watched to see to what extent the entertainment industry can protect copyright against Internet users. The accused - Peter Sunde, Gottfrid Svartholm Warg, Fredrik Neij and Carl Lundstrom - denied the charges. The group that controls The Pirate Bay, launched in 2003, says that since no copyrighted material is stored on its servers and no exchange of files actually takes place there, they cannot be held responsible for what material is being exchanged. The prosecution says that by financing, programming and administering the site, the four men promoted the infringement of property rights by the site's users. The trial could last as long as three weeks and the four accused face up to two years in jail if convicted. (Reuters)
(Source:EJC)

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Effort to Track Sex Offenders Draws Resistance

An aggressive federal effort to keep track of sexual offenders is at risk of collapse because of objections from states and legal challenges from sex offenders and others.The effort, approved by Congress three years ago, requires all states to adopt strict standards for registering sex offenders and is meant to prevent offenders from eluding the authorities, especially when they move out of state.

The law followed several heinous crimes by sex offenders on the run, including Joseph E. Duncan III, who in 2005 fled North Dakota, where he had been registered, and committed sex crimes and murder in three states, ending with the torture and killing of a 9-year-old boy in Montana.

An estimated 100,000 sex offenders are not living where they are registered, according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, which collects the data from the states and provides it to the United States Marshals Service and other federal agencies.

But officials in many states complain about the law’s cost and, in some instances, contend their laws are more effective than the federal one. The states also suggest that the federal requirements violate their right to set their own policies and therefore may be unconstitutional, at least in part.

Despite a looming July deadline, no state has been deemed compliant with the law, and some are leaning toward ignoring major requirements. As a result, one of the toughest child-protection initiatives in the nation’s history is languishing.

“We support the intent, and I’m sure every one of my attorney general colleagues supports the intent,” said Mark J. Bennett, the attorney general of Hawaii. “But we believed we couldn’t follow every single provision because, legally and practically, some of the provisions didn’t make sense.”

Some sex offenders and civil liberties groups have also taken court action to block the law’s provisions. In Ohio, a man convicted 15 years ago of “gross sexual imposition” involving a teenage girl is challenging the requirement that he remain on the state’s registry of sex offenders for the rest of his life, instead of the 10 years previously required by Ohio law.

“That’s not what I want my children to grow up with,” said the man, Darren L. Coey, 35.

Members of Congress say they may try to address some of the problems with the law. Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont and chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said through a spokeswoman that he planned “to determine whether revisions and improvements can strengthen compliance, and then to quickly make whatever changes may be needed.”

While some of the law’s backers acknowledge that the states have legitimate concerns, they remain fundamentally committed to the law, and suggest that the delays leave a patchwork of differing state laws that keep children unnecessarily vulnerable to predators.

Even with the spotty compliance and shortcomings, supporters say, the law has reaped benefits. Since its passage, the Marshals Service has brought charges against 615 sex offenders for failing to register or update their registration, an agency spokesman said.

“The single most important thing about it was creating a more consistent, uniform process across the country,” said Ernest E. Allen, president of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, an advocacy group. “There are a lot of states that really don’t know where these guys are.”

The law, the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act — named for a 6-year-old boy whose abduction and murder in 1981 changed how law enforcement agencies look for missing children — makes it a federal felony to fail to re register as a sex offender after moving to another state and requires states to toughen their penalties, now often misdemeanors, for failing to register at all.

It also requires offenders deemed especially dangerous to register for life and to renew their registration, usually in person, four times a year. In addition, the law expands the number of crimes for which sex offenders must register and requires states to collect more of their personal information and post much of it publicly.



Darren L. Coey has asked a court to block a federal requirement that would keep him on the registry for sex offenders for life