At last, some common sense shown in a film piracy case

A few days ago, I wrote about the case of Samantha Tumpach, a young Chicago woman who was being accused of film piracy and faced up to three years in jail if convicted, all for happening to catch four minutes of Twilight: New Moon on tape as she filmed her sister’s birthday party at a movie theater. Thankfully, the insanity in this case has turned towards reason: the prosecution has thrown out the case. Though, this may (or may not) be in part thanks to the support she received from a rather unexpected individual …

Hearing of her plight, Tumpach received support from an unlikely corner – Twilight: New Moon director Chris Weitz.

“Needless to say, the case seems to me terribly unfair and I would like to do what I can to address this,” Weitz wrote in an email.

Whether or not this pressure made any difference is unclear, but Tumpach left a courtroom a free woman today, the charge against her dismissed after prosecutors decided not to pursue the case.

It’s reassuring to see that not everyone in power has been twisted into mindless anti-piracy lunatics out to prosecute anyone who so much as takes a snapshot of a TV screen. Personally, though, my indignation with this case wasn’t that she risked going to jail; I never really expected that she ever would. Call me naïve, but even I don’t see prosecutors as being that downright crazy. In fact, it might have been good, in a bittersweet sort of way, to see Tumpach stand trial – not get convicted, of course, but just to bring the whole mess that is the MPAA-fueled anti-piracy overzealousness out into the open with some healthy media coverage. Maybe it would’ve forced some bored journalists to drop the tired and completely none-of-anyone’s-business Tiger Woods “scandal” and focus on some actual controversy for a change.

(via Fark.com)