Sony BMG Music Entertainment v. Tenenbaum

Sony BMG Music Entertainment v. Tenenbaum (1st Circuit Court) is the appeals lawsuit which followed the U.S. District Court case Sony BMG v. Tenenbaum, No. 07cv11446-NG (D. Mass. Dec. 7, 2009).

The initial district court decision awarded the plaintiffs $675,000 in statutory damages for Joel Tenenbaum's willful copyright infringement via peer-to-peer file-sharing of 30 songs. Tenenbaum then challenged the constitutionality of the damage award and asked for a retrial or a reduction of the award via common law remittitur. The district court judge rejected Tenenbaum's arguments in favor of a retrial, and declined to invoke remittitur because, in this case, it would prompt a retrial which would broach the constitutional issues remittitur was intended to avoid. Asserting that the question of the award's constitutionality was unavoidable, the judge reduced the damages to $67,500 on constitutional grounds, reasoning that the damages were effectively punitive, as well as excessive and in violation of Tenenbaum's Due Process rights.

Both parties then cross-appealed to the First Circuit Court of Appeals—Sony, et al., for full reinstatement of the original damages, and Tenenbaum challenging both liability and damages. The First Circuit rejected all of Tenenbaum's arguments, affirmed the denial of Tenenbaum's motion for a new trial, reversed the District Court's decision to reduce the damages, reinstated the original award, and remanded on the question of the common law remittitur.