This much is clear: Somebody made 1,701 songs available for illegal downloading.
In this cyber-age whodunit, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) says it has evidence that Jammie Thomas-Rasset did it, but the defense thinks the plaintiffs can't prove a thing.
RIAA lawyer Timothy Reynolds walked through evidence Monday that he said proves that the Brainerd mother of four is partly responsible for the billions of dollars recording companies have lost to online file sharing.
In 2007, a federal jury in Duluth found Thomas-Rasset liable and set damages at $9,250 per song or $220,000. But months later, Judge Michael Davis dismissed the verdict, citing faulty jury instructions.
In Thomas-Rasset's retrial in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis, her defense team is more aggressive. The recording industry calls it desperate; the defense calls it justified.
Reynolds presented documents and screen shots of Thomas-Rasset's Internet provider number and a modem number that links her computer to a Kazaa user that downloaded and may have distributed songs. Reynolds linked the Kazaa user "tereastarr," to Thomas-Rasset's e-mail, her MySpace account and her computer user name.
"What you will see, ladies and gentlemen, are not just mere coincidences," he said.
The defense, led by Kiwi Camara, contends that these coincidences prove nothing. "It cannot tell us that she was the person behind the computer," he said. "There is no one, no witness that said Ms. Thomas did it."
As Reynolds and RIAA attorney Matthew Oppenheim examined three witnesses, few minutes went by when the defense didn't object.
RIAA spokeswoman Cara Duckworth saw it as weakness. "They have objected more than 20 times to evidence that proves her liability," she said. "I think it's a desperate attempt to obscure the facts."
Joe Sibley, one of Thomas-Rasset's lawyers, said he is making sure the plaintiff dots every "I" and crosses every "T."
"As for the aggression," he said, "that's our style."
The five-man, seven-woman jury includes a college student, a retiree and a woman who hasn't used the Internet in years. All jurors either own an MP3 player or are close to someone who does.
The trial is expected to take about two weeks.
Alex Ebert • 612-673-4264
