Willful Infringement case: USA vs JULIUS CHOW LIEH LIU,

[lucia]

This is interesting as it touches on the meaning of "willfully!"

Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Northern District of California
James Ware, District Judge, Presiding

The panel vacated convictions and sentences on three counts of criminal copyright infringement and one count of trafficking in counterfeit labels in a case in which the defendant’s company commercially replicated CDs and DVDs for various clients on a scale that subjects the defendant to substantial criminal liability if a client – and, by extension, the defendant – lacked permission from the copyright holder to make the copies.

The panel held that the term “willfully” in 17 U.S.C. § 506(a) requires the government to prove that a defendant knew he was acting illegally rather than simply that he knew he was making copies, and that to “knowingly” traffic in counterfeit labels under 18 U.S.C. § 2318(a)(1) requires knowledge that the labels were counterfeit. Because the district court improperly instructed the jury otherwise and the errors were not harmless, the panel vacated the convictions and remanded.

The panel concluded that the district court should dismiss one of the copyright infringement counts on remand because counsel was ineffective by failing to raise an obvious statuteof- limitations defense.

*

[Greg Troy (KeepFighting)]

This looks very interesting, thanks for sharing it Lucia.

Do you have the link to the ruling you could share as well?

[lucia]

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:sKZVh-aAmroJ:cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2013/10/01/10-10613.pdf+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2013/10/01/10-10613.pdf‎

[Greg Troy (KeepFighting)]

Thanks Lucia!

[Lettered]

Interesting read and I think I learned something.  After reading that, am I correct in concluding that two different standards are applied regarding the definition of "willfully" depending on whether the civil part or criminal part of the statute is being interpreted?

When faced with a criminal statute containing an
ambiguous “willfulness” element, courts normally resolve
any doubt in favor of the defendant. Ratzlaf, 510 U.S. at 148
(citing Hughey v. United States, 495 U.S. 411, 422 (1990)).

If we were to read 17 U.S.C. § 506(a)’s
willfulness requirement to mean only an intent to copy, there
would be no meaningful distinction between civil and
criminal liability in the vast majority of cases. That cannot be
the result that Congress sought.

By defining “willfully infringed” without any requirement
that the defendant knew he was committing copyright
infringement, the district court instructed the jury to apply a
civil liability standard.