News Digest
Page 2 Daily Nebraskan Thursday, September 7,2000
T
MP3.com ordered to pay for violating laws
THE ASSOCIATm PRESS
NEW YORK—A federal judge
Wednesday ordered MP3.com to
pay as much as $250 million to
Universal Music Group for violat
ing the record company’s copy
rights by making thousands of
CDs available for listening over
the Internet
U.S. District Judge Jed S.
Rakoff punished the online
music-sharing service at $25,000
per CD, saying it was necessary to
send a message to Internet com
panies.
Universal Music Group, the
world’s largest record company,
had urged a stiff penalty in a case
closely watched by Napster and
dther businesses that share music
or other copyrighted material
over the Internet
The judge said some Internet
companies "may have a miscon
ception that, berause their tech
nology is somewhat novel, they
are somehow immune from the
ordinary applications of laws of
the United States, including copy
right law.”
He added: "They need to
understand that the law’s domain
knows no such limits.”
MP3.com said it will appeal.
The company had argued that a
penalty of any more than $500 per
CD would be a virtual “death sen
tence.”
Shares ofMP3.com were halt
ed before the decision: the most
recent trade was at $7.88 per
share, down 68.8 cents on the
Nasdaq Stock Market.
Universal was the only plain
tiff. The nation’s four other major
record companies settled with
MP3.com after Rakoff found earli
er this year that MP3.com had vio
lated copyrights. The amount of
the settlements was not dis
closed, but MP3.com set aside
$150 million recently to cover its
legal costs.
Universal lawyer Hadrian
Katz had asked the judge to award
the record company up to $450
million because MP3.com had
copied 5,000 to 10,000 of its CDs.
"Music is a media and the next
infringement may be very differ
ent,” Katz said. "It may be video or
it may be film or it may be books
or it may be something very dif
ferent.”
MP3.com lawyer Michael
Rhodes argued that Universal did
not deserve what he described as
a windfall. "There's not one iota of
evidence that they even lost a
penny,” he said.
MP3.com chief executive
Michael Robertson testified that
the company went to great
lengths to develop software that
would require customers to prove
they already own CDs before they
were permitted to hear their
favorite tunes over the Internet.
In January, the company
began the MyMP3.com listening
service, which allows customers
to hear CDs from anywhere once
they prove they own them by
inserting them into a computer
CD slot.
MP3.com, Rhodes said, sus
pended the illegal aspects of the
service when the judge ruled ear
lier this year that MP3.com was
violating copyrights. The compa
ny then sought to negotiate deals
with the record companies.
Earlier this year, a federal
judge issued an order that would
have virtually shut down
‘There’s not one iota
of evidence that they
even lost a penny.”
*
Michael Rhodes
MP3.com lawyer
Napster’s music-sharing service.
The injunction, which is on hold
pending an appeal, was sought by
the Recording Industry
Association of America, which
sued Napster for copyright
infringement.
Unlike Napster, which allows
individuals to swap music in the
popular MP3 format, MP3.com
allows people to listen to songs
but not download them to their
computers. MP3.com has an
online catalog of80,000 CDs.
Tuna industry
under criticism
IHE ASSOCIATED PRESS
TOKYO—Already under criticism for expanding
its annual whale hunt, Japan is bracing for an even
bigger fishing dispute with the United States - over
how to regulate the lucrative tuna industry.
At a 24-country conference on migratory fish that
ended Tuesday, Japan was one of five participants
that refused to agree to a U.S.-backed proposal to
establish a commission to regulate the catch of tuna
in the western and central Pacific Ocean.
The parting of ways came less than a week after
U.S. officials boycotted a United Nations environ
mental conference held in southern Japan in protest
over Japan’s decision last month to scale up its whal
ing activities for research purposes.
A Japanese government official said Wednesday
that Japan was opposed primarily to the proposed
tuna commission’s decision-making rules, which in
most cases don’t allow members to dissent from a
majority decision.
“Every country has its own set of circumstances,
and there is a possibility that the majority will agree to
some regulations that simply can’t be implemented
by one country or another,” said Ikuo Takeda, an offi
cial in the Fishery Agency’s International Division.
He was speaking a day after members of the
Japanese delegation in Honolulu warned that Japan
might ignore any new regulations if its concerns were
not taken into account
TWo-thirds of the world’s tuna is caught in the
region and is valued at $1.5 billion to $2 billion ayear.
While Pacific tuna stocks are not currently threat
ened, supporters of the agreement said it is necessary
to ensure their future.
The agreement allows the commission to set lim
its on how many fish could be caught, where they
could be taken, the times of the year fishing would be
permitted and what type of gear could be used.
Besides Japan, South Korea opposed the deal,
while China, France and Tonga abstained.
Tokyo is weathering a storm of international criti
cism raised in late August when Japanese fishermen
killed sperm and Bryde’s whales for the first time in
more than a decade.
Weather
TODAY
Thunder storms
high 81, low 58
TOMORROW
Partly cloudy
high 82, low 65
Mill
u mini:
Mothers Against
Drunk Driving
volunteer
Deanna Hoskins
becomes emo
tional during a
20th anniver
sary rally out
side the Ui.
Capitol on
Wednesday in
Washington D.C
Six hundred
drunk driving
victims and
activists called
on Congress to
enact pending
legislation to
lower the drunk
driving limit to
.08 blood-alco
hol content in
every state.
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DAILY NEBRASKAN
Plea bargain sends man to jail
■ Former doctor pleads guilty to
poisoning patients in two states.
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
CENTRAL ISLIP, N.Y.—A former doc
tor suspected in a string of poisoning
deaths on two continents, pleaded guilty
Wednesday to killing three patients in a
Long Island hospital and was sentenced to
life in prison without parole.
Prosecutors said Michael Swango killed
for pleasure, and they read entries from a
handwritten journal in which he mused
about “the sweet, husky, close smell of
indoor homicide.” Another entry suggest
ed that murder was “the only way I have of
reminding myself that I’m still alive.”
Swango, 45, pleaded guilty to three
counts of murder in a plea bargain that
spared him the possibility of the death
penalty.
He was accused of giving lethal injec
tions to three patients in 1993 at the
Veterans Affairs Hospital in Northport.
He also pleaded guilty to lying on his
resume' to get medical jobs. Swango also is
suspected of poisoning patients in
Zimbabwe and served time in prison for
poisoning co-workers in Illinois.
A book about him, "Blind Eye: The Story
of a Doctor who Got Away with Murder,”
suggests that Swango may have killed as
many as 35 patients as he moved from hos
pital to hospital, lying about his back
ground.
According to the book, Swango was
dubbed "Double-0 Swango” by classmates
at Southern Illinois University Medical
School, who joked that he had a “license to
kill” just like James Bond, Agent 007, after
several of his cases ended in death.
Under the plea bargain, Swango will
return to Ohio to acknowledge the murder
of a 19-year-old gymnast killed in 1984 by a
dose of potassium at Ohio State
University’s hospital. As part of the plea
agreement, Zimbabwe agreed not to pur
sue charges.
“I just hope Michael spends the rest of
his life in a living hell,” said Carol Fisher,
whose father, Thomas Sammarco, was one
of Swango’s Long Island victims.
“Unfortunately, there are maniacs like
Swango in this world,” said Rosalinda
Conroy, whose stepfather, George Siano,
was murdered. “You just don’t think they’re
going to be your doctor.”
After the 1984 death in Ohio, Swango
returned to his Quincy, 111., home and
worked as an emergency medical techni
cian.
That job ended with his conviction for
lacing co-workers’ coffee and doughnuts
with ant poison. Five of them became ill,
and Swango served two years. He also lost
his medical license.
In 1993, he landed a residency in New
York state by lying on his job application.
He was dismissed after his record became
public knowledge, and he went to Africa.
Within a year, patients in a Zimbabwe hos
pital showed signs of poisoning.
He was suspended there in 1995, and
was arrested two years later in Chicago as
he was boarding a flight to Saudi Arabia for
a new medical job
Lieberman to
run for senate,
vice presidency
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
HARTFORD, Conn. — Sen.
Joseph Lieberman can run for
both the vice presidency and re
election to the Senate, the state
Elections Enforcement
Commission confirmed
Wednesday.
The panel’s general counsel,
Jeffrey Garfield, rejected the com
plaint of a politics professor who
said Lieberman’s re-election cam
paign was “frivolous” and “irre
sponsibly self-indulgent" and
urged that he be eliminated from
the Senate ballot.
Lieberman had already
announced his intention to run
for re-election when A1 Gore
selected him to be his running
mate. If elected to both offices,
Lieberman would have to resign
from the Senate.
Garfield said a 1964 written
opinion by the attorney general \
found that state election laws per- 'v
mitted such a dual candidacy.
Garfield said he had informed
Fairfield University Professor
John Orman of his decision.
Orman said Wednesday he
was deciding whether to press his
case further.
World/Nation
The Associated Press
■Connecticut
Collection of African
documents given to college
TORRS — The African
National Congress is giving thou
sands of boxes of documents,
including some of Nelson
Mandela’s anguished personal
letters, to the University of
Connecticut.
South African officials said
the archive, launched
Wednesday, will remind the
world how decades of brutal
white rule were overcome.
"It is a disease which, if we are
not able to cure it, will repeat itself
in the 21st century,” said Frene
Ginwala, the speaker of South
Africa’s parliament and a promi
nent ANC leader.
The $1.1 million project will
take several years to set up.
The collection will focus on
documents that were kept secret
for years, from schoolchildren’s
drawings to the correspondence
of leaders such as Mandela,
South Africa’s former president
and Chris Hani, the late leader of
the ANC’s military wing.
■Canada
Ten arrested in Toronto,
Vancouver drug seizure
TORONTO — Canadian
police said Tuesday they made
one of the largest heroin seizures
in the nation’s history, confiscat
ing 343 pounds of illicit drugs,
some packed into fake duck eggs.
According to police officials,
10 ethnic Chinese in Toronto and
Vancouver were arrested on drug
smuggling and possession
charges after police and border j
patrol agents intercepted two
separate shipments.
Police had been investigating
Asian drug smugglers in separate
investigations since last year.
While the shipments arrived sep
arately inToronto and Vancouver,
police believe they were linked
because of the amount of heroin
involved and the proximity of
their arrival.
The first shipment was seized
Aug. 31 in Toronto and contained
125 pounds of heroin, along with
37 pounds of ecstasy pills hidden
inside fake duck eggs, said Supt.
Ben Soave of the Royal Canadian
Mounted Police.
■East Timor
Wild rampage in Indonesia
casts shadow over U»N.
DILI,—Thousands of armed
militiamen and their supporters
rampaged through a U.N. office
in West Timor, killing at least three
workers - including one from
Puerto Rico - and burning their
bodies.
The brutal attack brought
new pressure against Indonesia's
president as he gathered with
world leaders at the United k
Nations.
Four U.N. helicopters
swooped down to the border
town of Atambua and safely evac
uated 54 people, but world lead
ers quickly and harshly punished
Indonesia for not doing more to
protect aid workers.
Witnesses said Indonesian
security forces stood by as the
mobs torched the U.N. office and
beat the workers.
The unprecedented violence
- one U.N. official said it was one
of the worst attacks on U.N. per
sonnel anywhere in the world -
cast a shadow over the U.N.
Millennium Summit, which
opened Wednesday in New York.
■Texas
Law banning same sex
marriages overlooked
SAN ANTONIO — A woman
and a transsexual, who was bom
a man, obtained a marriage
license Wednesday, taking
advantage of a court ruling that
defines gender only by chromo
somes.
Jessica Wicks and Robin
Manhart Wicks, who took
Jessica’s surname this year, were
allowed to get their license, even
though they consider them
selves a same-sex couple. Had
Jessica Wicks been born a
woman, their marriage would be
illegal.
However, because of a state
appeals court ruling that said
chromosomes determine gen
der, the two will be able to wed.
Phyllis Randolph Frye, an
attorney for the Wicks, said the
couple has advanced the rights
of gays, lesbians and transsexu
als across the country.
