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Comment by chris_wot | Hacker News Reader

Why the hell is this case still going? Put these guys in jail and take away all their money already!

If the case would just "stop", they wouldn't go to jail - all Judge Wright imposed were monetary sanctions(he only threatened incarceration). Furthermore, the monetary sanctions aren't even that big(compared to the claims of the money they made).

But specifically to answer your question, the reason is that there's an appellate system. And unless you want to argue that the appellate system shouldn't exist, "bad guys" get to use it to argue their case, just like "good guys".

Furthermore, as Pietz points out in his oral argument, Judge Wright was exasperated at how much the justice system constrains punishing bad actors abusing the system. This is a core issue, and it's not as easily solved as waving a wand around.

Do we have supreme court worthy case on our hands?

I highly doubt it. They could try to appeal when they lose this case, but I highly doubt any higher court is going to pick it up as it doesn't really deal with any new matters of law.

What I want to know is where are the state bar associations in all of this. I seem to recall several referrals from federal judges, which are generally treated with some dispatch.

The fact that they are still being allowed to operate (albeit now using the ADA to extort rather than the copyright law) is a travesty.

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150104/12002529596/john-...

The gears of the judiciary grind slowly, but grind they do. They're grinding these Prenda guys down to their component atoms. That can take a while.

And in the meantime, it slows up the system for everyone else. The grinding can go both ways you know.

the system is "slow" by design. The ability to appeal means that a potentially wrongly-accused person has a second chance for justice.

I'm not saying it's not frustrating; I am definitely frustrated with it at times as well. But this part of the system, at least, is attempting to maximize "justice" (at the very least, to counteract the parts of the system that do not attempt it)

This is why there are turtles at the base of the columns at the Supreme Court.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/morgonmae/2437913438

What's interesting about the civil litigation system is that it is used to dealing with sociopaths and narcissists. After all, they are the ones most likely to wind up in civil litigation. Most people can be deceived by a sociopath's slick manipulations and lies because they naively believe that all people are generally good. Judges in the civil litigation arena are under no such illusions.

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