Elektra Entertainment Group, Inc. v. Does 1-6

Full title: ELEKTRA ENTERTAINMENT GROUP, INC. ET AL., Plaintiffs v. DOES 1-6…

Court: United States District Court, E.D. Pennsylvania

Date published: Oct 12, 2004

Civil Action No. 04-1241 (E.D. Pa. Oct. 12, 2004)

Opinion

Civil Action No. 04-1241.

October 12, 2004

ORDER

CYNTHIA RUFE, District Judge

AND NOW, this 12th day of October, 2004, upon consideration of Plaintiffs' Motion for Leave to Take Immediate Discovery [Doc. #4], the Declaration of Jonathan Whitehead in support thereof [Doc. #5], and Plaintiffs' Second Supplemental Memorandum in support thereof [Doc. #13], and after several conferences with counsel for Plaintiffs and counsel for the amici curiae,¹ it hereby ORDERED that Plaintiffs' Motion is GRANTED. It is further ORDERED as follows:

1 Although the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Pennsylvania, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and the Public Citizen did not intervene as amici curiae in the above-captioned case, they have intervened and appear on the record in most or all of the other related music cases filed in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. Further, the amici curiae participated in the drafting of the Court Ordered Notice described in paragraph 3 of this Order, and Plaintiffs have acknowledged that the amici have appeared to protect the rights of the Doe Defendants in all of the related music cases.

1. Plaintiffs may take immediate discovery on the University of Pennsylvania to obtain the identity of each Doe Defendant by serving a Rule 45 subpoena that seeks information sufficient to identify each Doe Defendant, including name, address, telephone number, e-mail address, and Media Access Control addresses for each Defendant.

2. Plaintiffs may use the information obtained by this Rule 45 subpoena solely for the purpose of protecting Plaintiffs' rights under the Copyright Act.

3. Plaintiffs shall attach the Court Directed Notice Regarding Issuance of Subpoena, a copy of which is attached to this Order, to the aforementioned Rule 45 subpoena. The Rule 45 subpoena shall instruct the University of Pennsylvania to distribute a copy of said notice to each Doe Defendant within seven days of service of the subpoena.

4. This ruling applies to all current and future cases filed in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania that are related to the above-captioned case.

5. Any future notices to any Defendant in this case or any related case filed in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania must be pre-approved by the Court and filed in the record.

It is so ORDERED.