Updated: 5/5/2004 6:15 PM
By: Stacy Neumann & Web Staff

Johnson said she isn't going to pay the RIAA.

A Fayetteville grandmother is facing off with the recording industry. The Recording Industry Association of America said she illegally downloaded and shared copyrighted songs.

About a month ago, Barbara Johnson tried to log onto AOL and found she was cut off. She called the company.

"They told me they did it because of the downloading and sharing the files with everyone else,” Johnson said.

Then she received a letter from AOL. It said the Recording Industry Association of America plans to subpoena her account.

Johnson said it was her grandson Deron who downloaded music using a popular file sharing program. When she found out it was illegal, she spoke to him about it.

"My grandma told me to stop so I stopped,” Deron said. “I stopped downloading but I didn't delete my programs."

An RIAA phone call last week informed Johnson that Deron had downloaded 520 songs.

"Those 520 songs will cost you $750 and I said, 'What?’” Johnson said.

That's $750 for each song but the association says it will settle for $3,500.

"I said, 'You know what? You won't get it because I don't have it,’” Johnson said.

Johnson said it's not fair to hold her financially responsible for what her grandson did. She doesn't let him use the computer without supervision now and she's hoping RIAA leaves her alone.

"There're a lot of kids out there downloading music, grownups too,” Johnson said. “Some grownups even download movies. So why do they come after me?"

The RIAA has sued more than 2,000 people for illegal Internet music sharing. More than 400 have opted to settle their lawsuits
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"So why do they come after me?"
For the same reason vultures go after the very ill or dead...these people are cowards and look for easy targets....

each one of the RIAA is an ISH-BESHOTH...a man of shame (or woman of shame)

I insist that the RIAA take this old woman for everything she's got. Destroy her and let her rott away into nothing in her old age. Who needs her? This is about the artist. Come get what's coming to you grandma.

Hey George W., fuck you for not speaking a word about this.

or any of the others.

OK....So when did downloading become illegal?

And while we're searching our souls for the answer to this (and other pressing questions), what happend to the "more than a thousand" songs offered for download?

Are we to assume that "The Industry" lied? Oh, please tell me it isn't so!!! The very people who are self appointed to "Educate America" are leaving us with a hint of a perception of dishonesty....What shall I do? Where will I turn for guidance? My life has no meaning...NOT

Give me a paypal Link.
I'll contribute 10.00 to her legal fund.
I know it's not much, but I am on a fixed income myself.

Grandma got ran over by the RIAA

lol stilltrying

If she ends up having to pay them...pay them in cookies...laced with Ex-Lax

So Leflaw, Mroop, Hammerofjustice, why don't you step up and defend this person???? Pro Bono...

Good PR for you and your respective firms.

You know they had targeted an older woman in Boston a while back and it turned out she wasnt a Snoop Dogg Fan, as they had previously thought. When the first wave of law suits came out we were all laughing saying its just a matter of time before they hit someone and the media has a field day with it. May not be national news, but I bet it hit the area where she lives and that is more than enough to discourage people in that area not to buy products from these dead beats. They go after her because they know you will settle with them, its easy to know the region where you live with an IP address, what a coincidence Beverly Hills hasnt been hit with a law suit yet. I love you Mrs Johnson, you are the kind of people we need, wish there were more brave souls like you that would take this peices of shit head on.

for one thing, like totallyfrustrated said, it's not illegal. second, I don't see how they can hold her responsible for something she didn't do. Yes surfside, I'd love to see our lawyers (save one) get in on this act.

And I ll tell you another thing, Matt Oppenheim deserves to be behind bars for what he told that 12 year old. Real classy of the RIAA to bully a 12 year old and have Matt say that he is one dentist the 12 year old doesnt ever want to visit. If that was my kid, Matt would have gotten a fist full of knuckles.

When the media says download they mean file share, they are just ignorant kind of like they confuse piracy with copyright infringement.

GGGRRR now i am pissed.

"Johnson said it's not fair to hold her financially responsible for what her grandson did." Not only is it not fair, its not fair that these RIAA criminals can hold you responsible without any proof that your grandson actually distributed anything.

FUCKING RIAA ALWAAYS SUING PEOPLE. SUE ME U HAVEN'T YET. U WON'T EITHER.

This year, grandmothers and old blind ladies have had it rough...
in the Metroplex (Dallas area), a 97 year old lady is arrested for driving with
expired registration..handuffed and put in a cell....

And here is an outrageous one...
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/steve_duin/index.ssf?/base/news/1082807738251705.xml
by Steve Duin

Even blind old ladies terrify the cops
Sunday, April 25, 2004
She was 71 years old.

She was blind.

She needed her 94-year-old mother to come to her rescue.

And in the middle of the dogfight -- in which Eunice Crowder was pepper-sprayed, Tasered and knocked to the ground by Portland's courageous men in blue -- the poor woman's fake right eye popped out of its socket and was bouncing around in the dirt.

How vicious and ugly can the Portland police get? Ladies and gentlemen, I think we have a winner. This 2003 case is so blatant, the use of force so excessive, the threat of liability so intimidating that the city just approved a $145,000 settlement.

But all those gung-ho fans of the cops can relax. Nothing has changed. Nothing will upset the status quo.

The cops aren't apologizing.

The cops aren't embarrassed.

The cops haven't been disciplined.

And the cops are still insisting, to the bitter end, that they "reasonably believed" this blind ol' bat was a threat to their safety and macho culture.

Eunice Crowder, you see, didn't follow orders. Eunice was uncooperative. Worried a city employee was hauling away a family heirloom, a 90-year-old red toy wagon, she had the nerve to feel her way toward the trailer in which her yard debris was being tossed.

Enter the police. Eunice, who is hard of hearing, ignored the calls of Officers Robert Miller and Eric Zajac to leave the trailer. When she tried, unsuccessfully, to bite the hands that were laid on her, she was knocked to the ground.

When she kicked out at the cops, she was pepper-sprayed in the face with such force that her prosthetic marble eye was dislodged. As she lay on her stomach, she was Tased four times with Zajac's electric stun gun.

And when Nellie Scott, Eunice's 94-year-old mother, tried to rinse out her daughter's eye with water from a two-quart Tupperware bowl, what does Miller do? According to Ernie Warren Jr., Eunice's lawyer, the cop pushed Nellie up against a fence and accused her of planning to use the water as a weapon.

Paranoia runs deep. Into your life it will creep. It starts when you're always afraid . . .

Afraid and belligerent. "Cops have changed," Warren said. "When I grew up, they weren't people who huddled together and their only friends were the cops. You had access to them all the time. You weren't afraid of them."

What did Police Chief Derrick Foxworth have to say about the case? "This did not turn out the way we wanted it to turn out," Foxworth said Friday. "Looking back, and I know the officers feel this as well, they may have done something differently. We would have wanted the minimal amount of force to have been used. But I feel we need to recognize Ms. Crowder has some responsibility. She contributed to the situation."

Granted. But Eunice was 71. She was blind. That probably explains why a judge threw out all charges against her and why the city, in a stone-cold panic, settled ASAP.

"This was like fighting Ray Charles or Stevie Wonder," Warren said. "It wasn't a fair fight."

No, but it was another excuse to haul out the usual code words about the cops' "reasonable" belief that they were justified to use a "reasonable amount of force to defend themselves."

If you have a different definition of "reasonable," you just don't understand the Portland police. You need to remember the words of Robert King, head of the police union, defending Officer Jason Sery in the March shooting of James Jahar Perez:

"What sets us apart from people like most of you is that you'll never face a situation in your job where -- in less than 10 seconds -- the routine can turn to truly life-threatening," King wrote. "When that happens to us, when we have to make that ultimate split-second decision, we don't just ask for your understanding, we ask for your support."

She was 71 years old. She was blind. She was lucky, I guess, that these cops -- set apart from people like most of us -- didn't make the usual split-second decision and draw their guns. "

I think Cary Sue and the boys will probably be training with that police department....

BTW, the facts of this case are even more outrageous...I heard an interview with the attorney for the blind lady....at some point, the blind lady, her one eye full of pepper spray, asked her 94 year old mother to go get some water to rinse her eye...one of the two cops who were holding the blind lady down, chased her mom in the house as she was going to get the water...the cop accused her of heading to get a gun...she poured water in a jug, and he THEN SAID HE WAS CONVINCED SHE WAS TRYING TO ATTACK HIM WITH THE WATER...I kid you not....

What is it, open season on the defenseless?

sorry, i just noticed the story did report the "attack with water" part...

This is a bit off-topic...I haven't seen anyone comment on the New York Times story from today that read "Record Labels Must Pay Shortchanged Performers". You guys don't want to jump all over that? The RIAA might have finally put a face on their "piracy" that the American public can recognize. Look at the artists that they claimed they couldn't find.

"The RIAA has sued more than 2,000 people for illegal Internet music sharing. More than 400 have opted to settle their lawsuit"

What has, or is happening with the rest of the 1600 who haven't settled.??? We need to find this out. I hope Barbara Johnson will hold out against these guys. Then we have another case to follow. ~pepe~

Yeah what happened to the people who havent settled.

I'll draft her pleadings for free, if she gets local counsel and wants to fight.

Larry, we need to find someone who wants to fight.

If they file suit against her we can get rule 11 sanctions or atorney fees purusuant to a successful CR defense.

Of course her grandson will have problems later, maybe but hell if he's down? I'm down.

""I said, 'You know what? You won't get it because I don't have it,’” Johnson said."

You tell 'em grandma!

The RIAA once said that the reason CD prices are 'so high' is because only 10% of their artists actually return a profit on their investment. And that the 10% has to compensate for the remaining 90% that lose money.

This doesn't suprise me, because suing people who have no money is about as stupid as running a business where 90% of your efforts are losing money.

It's no wonder it's a failing business model. They have sued around 2,000 people for aprox. $3,500 each. Only 400 have settled. Which gives them $1,400,000. And yet they've spent $10,000,000 in legal and attorney fees to try and save a business model that succeeds in only 10% in all of it's efforts.

Hey, makes perfect sense to me...

This *MUST* go to court. It needs to. But I bet it doesn't. I bet the RIAA will either let her off (Because they don't want anyone going to court as they may actually lose). Or someone will pay off her demand. This no good. OK I feel sorry for her but we need these kind of people to go into court to show how evil the RIAA is!

I doubt the RIAA will let her off, if it does, it has admitted failure and the RIAA wont do that, that is until the big five realize that suing customers will not generate enough revenue to in the least reach a break even point with the cost of law suits. However, I do agree it needs to go to court, they will probably push her to settle, get the settlement down to around $2k or something in hopes that it goes away.

Well, folks, I'm from North Carolina, where this grandmother lives, and while I don't live near Fayetteville, it did make news in my part of the State. Big news since we'd been unscathed...until now.

I'm glad the grandma said "No, I won't settle" to those punks. Now this will go to trial and it'll be thrown out on the grounds that there's no hard evidence. Yes, the RIAA "alleges" that the grandmother downloaded. All they have is an IP address and maybe times of day when Kazaa, or whatever program, was used. They probably only know that 520 songs were in the shared folder. Do they have the IP addresses of every person who accessed that folder? Probably not.

So, here's to hoping one of my fellow North Carolinians finally sticks it to the RIAA!

I think this is totally UNAMERICAN at a time in which THE IS AT WAR! THER IS ENOUGH CIVIL UNREST AND WE DON'T NEED ANYMORE! & Btw, a housewife is NOT a good person to PISS OFF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

DON'T MESS WITH MAMA AND LEAVE OUR BABIES ALONE!!!!!!

Here we go again with suing poor little grandmothers. This is extortion, and she has every right to not give in those pigfuckers.

If they come knocking on my door, they'll be up for a big surprise. Say hello to Mr. Baseball Bat!

NiceGuy2003 Stay on top of this story the best way you can.

This case will likely confuse a lot of folks, because it seems to imply that the RIAA can track what people download.

Niceguy2003 is on the right track: the RIAA probably ascertains that 520 songs were downloaded because they have digital fingerprints on the songs which 'grandma' was sharing.

But ..... the key here is not to share RIAA affiliated music if you are using a P2P app (a point that gdZ had made in the past).

By the way, where is gdZiemman?

Apologize for my ignorance, but I have been offline for the past 3 weeks or so (getting settled in my new assignment here in S. Korea).

Bufo...South Korea? Be careful my friend...best wishes for everything to go well.


I confess I don't know what George is doing. I've been busy as a one legged man at a butt kicking contest trying to bring the newest news forward.

This grandma seems to be unlike the Boston grandma; (the boston grandma, if i' remember correctly, had a mac); in this case, her computer has 520 songs, which are probably being shared as we speak. In addition, I find no will-power for this grandma to fight it.... because i'm sure that's on everyone's minds who have received a letter from their ISP's or RIAA regarding downloading and sharing copyrighted music. In the end, I think this grandma is going to settle to prevent huge legal fees. (the riaa is not going to be sentimental about this case.)

To Synthetikk242: They have sued around 2,000 people for aprox. $3,500 each. Only 400 have settled. Which gives them $1,400,000. And yet they've spent $10,000,000 in legal and attorney fees to try and save a business model that succeeds in only 10% in all of it's efforts.
Where did you get this? For each lawsuit they file, its costs them about $200. Moreover, some of the folks at RIAA are lawyers... and they'r finally working really hard.

i know this question has probably been answered somewhere, but can they still track your ass if you don't share?

Go to any market in the UK and you will almost certainly be able to buy pirate audio and DVD films for peanuts, I believe these people who are supposedly representing the record companies should be held to account by the self same record companies. Instead of wasting time with persuing and alienating the industies customers they should be out there cracking down on the real pirates. You have to ask where the trading standards people are when its so open and prevalent. However I am pretty much sick to death with the whole thing now, its the same ground covered over and over. I don't think it is possible for the consumer to bring about any change from the RIAA, it must come from the record companies. Perhaps people should be lobbying them and not waste anymore time with the RIAA.