Grandmother Porn Lawsuit Dropped

The Chicago law firm Steele Hansmeier PLLC has dropped its case against the San Francisco Bay Area-based grandmother who was sued for allegedly downloading pornography from a BitTorrent site, according to SFGate.

The Huffington Post reported about the case in July, when the 70-year-old woman, who asked to remain anonymous, received a threatening letter from the law firm, suing her for illegally downloading pornography — a crime she claims she didn't commit. According to TorrentFreak, the firm offered to settle for $3,400 from the woman. Now, she no longer needs to worry about the fees or the case.

"It's such good news as this lawsuit has been hanging over my head," said the woman in an interview with SFGate. "But at the same time, there's a certain bitterness about the whole thing."

The woman expressed her disgust with the law firm when the suit was first filed. "It smacks of extortion," she said. The woman claimed that she had never downloaded pornography and that she had never heard of a BitTorrent. Her wireless Internet service was not password protected.

But John Steele, a partner at the prosecuting lawfirm, slammed her defense, stating that anyone who fails to secure their Wi-Fi is "as responsible for the subsequent crimes or tragedies as a parent who leaves a loaded gun within the reach of a 3-year-old."

SFGate reported that, after taking her story to the press, the woman received a letter from the law firm stating that it was dropping the charges against her, claiming that it had found the actual person responsible for the downloads and denying that the publicity had influenced the case.

But the woman disagreed. "They had an unwinnable case and I called them on it," she said to SFGate. "And I hope other people do, too."

Comments

[Dean Du Pont]

04:12 AM on 09/02/2011

"Porn Granny" isn't the only one who had her case dropped: Steele Hansmeier has been getting into a lot of trouble with various courts and judges recently. For those of you who don't read ArsTechnica, here's a few links to articles about John Steele, from oldest to newest:

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/03/judge-eviscerates-p2p-lawyer-i-accepted-you-at-your-word.ars

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/04/judge-administers-another-beatdown-to-p2p-lawyer-severs-cases.ars

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/05/judge-dont-bring-me-any-more-anonymous-file-sharing-lawsuits.ars

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/08/bittorrent-users-dont-act-in-concert-so-judge-slashes-mass-p2p-case.ars (This article discusses his trouble with Calif. courts.)

The first article has a picture of Mr. Steele. You'll probably agree that he has a seriously punchable face.

[dbrett480]

07:33 PM on 09/01/2011

Is this one of those law firms set up solely to sue people for copyright infringement?

[Pat Bateman2000]

12:16 PM on 09/01/2011

In celebration of her victory, she rubbed one out.

[jpalmettoguy]

08:42 AM on 09/01/2011

interesting

[Helen Greenfeld]

07:25 AM on 09/01/2011

Smart sharp lady. Good for her. She can teach alot of people more than a thing or two.

[Major Nikon]

07:12 AM on 09/01/2011

At least 95% of the law is pure bluff. The companies that are behind the lawsuits know they can never sue a fraction of a percent of the people downloading porn. Attorneys file these types of suits because they know the majority of people will pay $3,400 rather than going to the expense of hiring a lawyer and fighting it. In actuality, the companies suing really don't care about the money they can extort. Their main goal is to generate publicity that downloading porn will get you sued.

[REDSTATEREFUGEE]

04:20 PM on 08/31/2011

.....and if anyone wonders why there are so many attorney jokes around.

[Tiffany Towns]

01:58 PM on 08/31/2011

This doesn't sound like a respected law firm to me. intelligent law firms/attorneys don't go around filing lawsuits with this many holes. They should have done their due diligence in this BEFORE filing the suit. The fact that she didn't have a secure service is something that most likely came out in discovery. Although they may not have known who did it, the fact that it was someone other than the person they chose to sue was rather apparent. Not to mention that at her deposition I'd be confused if they didn't ask her if she had a history of watching porn. Embarrassing, yes. But no more shocking than when she found out she was being sued for downloading it!

I highly doubt she set her service up, so she didn't leave it open. For all we know, the person who did it could have left it open so he/she could use it for their own purposes. As I said at the beginning, I doubt this is a respected law firm that sued her and they probably wanted to end this as quickly and quietly they could before the floodgates started with all the other people they are trying to sue for the same thing calling BS on them.

[radtech21]

01:09 PM on 08/31/2011

good for you granny, you tell them. it is rediculous that they went after this old lady in the first place.

[puzlslvr41]

12:55 PM on 08/31/2011

This "law firm" (and I use that term loosely) used to be part of a much larger firm.....I believe they used to be part of the..."DEWEY, CHEATUM, and HOWE" partnership. My God....what a**bags!!!

[iluvsam]

12:07 PM on 08/31/2011

That lawyer is getting some heat in the comments. My law practice is defense oriented, but I do understand his point. The only information known when the demand is sent is the IP address and the name associated with it. All the law firm can infer is that the registered owner is also the downloader. In this case, the fact that the IP owner is a 70 year old woman is inconsequential. If someone is going to suggest that it is impossible for a 70 year old woman to want porn and to download it, I have a cheap bridge for sale. The firm can't say, "this IP is owned by a 70 year old woman, so it's not her", or "well she said it wasn't her, so I guess it wasn't." The act of NOT securing your wi-fi is not a legal excuse so as to avoid liability. If it were, all would say "it was someone else because my system isn't secure." I don't believe the lawyer was suggesting that all IP address owners be held "strictly liable" simply because they failed to secure their connections. If that IS what he was suggesting, then his suggestion is ridiculous. But, for others to suggest that a copyright holder should not infer from the evidence that it was the IP owner who downloaded and then to be able to proceed on that alone is equally ridiculous.

[Tom Gerace]

01:02 PM on 08/31/2011

The bottom line is that this entire trend of "speculative invoicing" is nothing but a scam being perpetrated by lawyers through our court system. There is NO intent to take any of these cases to trial. All these "lawyers" want is to use the court to generate mailing lists so that they can mail out demand letters and harvest easy money. All of your arguments protecting them denies that simple fact. This is about revenue generation, NOT justice.

[clarkkentdlyplnt]

01:29 PM on 08/31/2011

I TOTALLY agree. I had heart surgery a while back and have been making payments that I could afford to the hospital, but because my 20% was due and payable on my release,it's technically 'delinquent. I've had 4 different law firms try to pick up my 'delinquent' debt, all claiming to be the authorized agent, even though the hospital still accepts my monthly payment. Law firms just shot gun delinquent accounts hoping to bullysome one into paying them instead of the original creditor.

[G D]

01:04 PM on 09/02/2011

You're right the whole legal system is about revenue not justice.

[kristiemaureen]

01:40 PM on 08/31/2011

And when this law firm found out that the IP address owner was a 70 year old woman who didn't even know what BitTorrent was, was it not their responsibilty then to investigate further and find out who had been accessing the unsecured IP? If this was really about seeking justice, that would be so. Instead it was more about making a quick buck, hence the lack of interest in finding the actual guilty party and then attempting to extort a "settlement fee" from grandma.

[kelleyk2]

11:32 AM on 08/31/2011

So, following their (lack of) logic, if I leave my car out in the open, where anyone could steal it, and someone takes it to use as a getaway car, I could go to jail for the crime. Apparently, it's even worse if it turns out to be my 3 year old that did it, and they used the loaded gun I left on the table beside them.

Why is it, again, that lawyers have such a bad reputation?

[Catherine Girod]

01:55 PM on 08/31/2011

see, you understand. it's certainly not about people being responsible for their own behavior.

[nazztea]

11:31 AM on 08/31/2011

Not securing your WiFi IS kinda stupid.
You don't want to end up like the guy who was busted and had his apartment torn up by the FBI because his unsecured link was being used by a guy at a nearby marina to download child porn.

[Jonas Taylor]

01:25 PM on 08/31/2011

Actually, the problem was that ISPs sent out routers/modems that were insecure out-of-the-box. Not everybody that uses a computer can be expected to be knowledgeable about every possible setting, especially when it comes to the older generation who are less familiar with the technology. This problem is then compounded when legal firms and law enforcement make assumptions and don't properly investigate. To blame the user here is, quite frankly, insulting.

[tonijefferson3]

01:27 PM on 08/31/2011

At 70 years old, I doubt she would even know how to secure it.

[Catherine Girod]

01:57 PM on 08/31/2011

My mom was 77 when she died and could do pretty much anything with a computer.

[hman570]

11:09 AM on 08/31/2011

You go Granny!!!

[Drama Llama]

10:56 AM on 08/31/2011

"as responsible for the subsequent crimes or tragedies as a parent who leaves a loaded gun within the reach of a 3-year-old."

Stupid comparison of one thing to another extreme.

I guess for that matter anyone that leaves their car unlocked is guilty of grand theft auto.