A jury that awarded $300,000 in damages to TVT Records on Friday later informed the judge that they miscalculated their award.
Jury members contacted the presiding judge over the weekend and informed him they intended to give an award closer to $3 million, and admitted a mathematical error.
Just 24 hours later, that elation turned to confusion.
Somewhere between the jury deliberations and its final verdict, a zero got lost. Jurors said they intended the award to be much higher.
The jury specified an amount of damages for each of the 143 copyright certificates, and then each jury member was asked to confirm the amount in the court room. The jury found infringement for about 75 of the 143 copyrighted works in question.
Once the polling was complete, Judge Jed Rakoff instructed the court deputy to enter the verdict into the record.
In the end, the jury levied fines not much above the mandatory minimum of $750 per infringement in each case. The jury then went home for what they –- and everyone else -– believed would be a restful weekend.
When the Saturday morning paper arrived, two jurors said they were horrified to find out that they had fined the company $2.7 million less than they thought. Immediately, they called Rakoff explaining the situation, and he decided to bring everyone back to court on Monday to sort everything out.
On Monday, Rakoff interviewed seven of the eight jurors privately, trying to determine how this situation had occurred. The eighth juror –- the woman in charge of adding up the final totals -– was interviewed on Tuesday.
Rakoff told lawyers Monday that the jurors apparently omitted a zero when assessing the damage amount for the majority of works involved. Instead of $3,125 for each of about 75 works, the damage award should have been $31,250 per work.
Rakoff also asked lawyers for MP3.com and Tee Vee Toons, which is owned by TVT Records, to submit arguments about the matter. A clerk for the judge said he is not expected to rule for about three weeks.
Regardless of the final amount of an award, MP3.com will appeal the case.
MP3.com CEO Michael Robertson said his company would begin the appeals process immediately.
In March, Rakoff handed TVT Records a victory in its copyright infringement case against the company for the My.mp3.com service that launched in January 2000. That judgment came after Rakoff issued a similar ruling in a lawsuit brought by the Recording Industry Association of America against MP3.com.
In ruling against MP3.com, Rakoff dismissed the company’s claims that the creation of its database fell under the fair use doctrine which, among other things, allows consumers to make audio tapes of CDs for personal use.
Privately owned TVT Records sued MP3.com claiming its instant listening service violated TVT copyrights by making TVT songs available for listening to Web surfers. Tee Vee Toons represents artists such as Snoop Dogg and Nine-Inch Nails. Reuters contributed to this reports.
