Kevin Wayne Williams wrote:
> Kevin Gowen wrote:
> 
>> Kevin Wayne Williams wrote:
>>  > Kevin Gowen wrote:
>>  >
>>  > > Eric Takabayashi wrote:
>>  > >
>>  > >
>>  > >>Kevin Gowen wrote:
>>  > > No, because treating file swapping as receiving stolen goods is a 
>> loser,
>>  > > since copyright infringement is not theft. Also, if I buy a 
>> CD/movie and
>>  > > then encode it and put it in my share directory, the people who 
>> download
>>  > > it are making a copy of a product that was legally purchased. For
>>  > > receiving stolen goods, first you need goods that have been stolen.
>>  > >
>>  > > The entertainment companies are being harsh to make examples of 
>> people.
>>  >
>>  > Which was the point I tripped over my own feet trying to make the last
>>  > time this topic came up. We don't treat most copyright infringement 
>> as a
>>  > criminal offense, which puts the entertainment industry in a really
>>  > nasty position. With shoplifting, the police at least pretend to care,
>>  > and will run the kid through the police station and try frighten 
>> him out
>>  > of repeating it. With major theft of physical goods, they will 
>> undertake
>>  > criminal prosecution, which makes winning the later civil case for
>>  > damages much easier. With file swapping, you get kids "infringing" a
>>  > half-million dollars in music, and nothing happening to them unless 
>> the
>>  > entertainment industry sues. With physical goods, little Johnny 
>> would be
>>  > on the rock-pile, and mom and dad would be locked up as 
>> accessories. We
>>  > have placed the burden of law-enforcement on private companies, who 
>> have
>>  > to finance the investigation and prosecution on their own behalf, and
>>  > then wonder why they act so ruthlessly. We haven't given them much 
>> of a
>>  > choice. The police aren't able to act, the criminal courts aren't able
>>  > to act, the legislatures won't pass corrective legislation to equate
>>  > copyright infringment with theft. Their only option is to press their
>>  > civil cases loud and hard, with as much publicity as possible and
>>  > seeking maximum damages.
>>
>> Where do you get the idea that Mom and Dad are accessories when Johnny 
>> steals chattel?
> 
> 
> If little Johnny was running a fencing operation out of his bedroom, 
> sufficient in scope to move a half-million dollars worth of physical 
> goods, people would look long and hard at Mom and Dad's behaviour. They 
> may find nothing criminal. If they found that Mom and Dad had bought 
> Johnny the tools of his trade (the case when Mom and Dad buy and supply 
> the file sharing computer, or pay for a broadband modem), they would be 
> able to make an accessory theory of some kind apply. Not always a slam 
> dunk, not easy, but with that kind of dollar volume, the prosecutor 
> would be motivated to try.

Wow. Your lengthy qualifying hypothetical was quite a shift from 
"parents are accessories when children commit larceny".

A number of questions about larceny and accessory before/after the fact 
*will* be on the bar examination.

- Kevin