Supreme Court Passes on Illegal Downloads Case

By Brian Scott
Nov 29 2010

The case of Whitney Harper, accused of illegal music downloads, was denied this morning by the US Supreme Court, a ruling that is considered devastating to her case.

Whitney Harper was a teenager when she downloaded just over 500 songs from a peer-to-peer file sharing site and continued to share them with her friends.

Little did she know, her IP address was being tracked by the RIAA and years later she discovered that she was being sued by the governing body for millions in fines for her downloads.

When Harper went to court she claimed that she was responsible for the downloaded songs but did not know that it was illegal. She said that she was too young to understand the ramifications of her actions.

However, the court disagreed with her and said that she could not use her lack of knowledge and age as a defense.

In most cases the RIAA seeks about $200 per song in damages. In the case of Whitney Harper they asked the court for $750 per song and were awarded that amount. Since that time she has fought in court to have the fine suspended or reduced but the appeals courts have said that they will not consider the case.

Harper is now married with three children and she is still doing battle with the RIAA over the fines. If she does not get some kind of resolution she could wind up in jail for failure to pay court-ordered fines and penalties.