“Thanks, but…” Supreme Court Passes on Yahoo! Case
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Written By Reprise Media | May 31, 2006 | Share This
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Yesterday, the Supreme Court said “non” to a case concerning French censorship, Yahoo! and Nazi memorabilia, according to the IDG News Service. At issue was whether Yahoo! could legally use the US courts to counter-sue a pair of French groups that had won a ruling in France against the search engine.
If you’re saying ‘Huh?’ you’re not the only one. E. Randol Schoenberg (of LA law firm Burris & Schoenberg) calls the matter “very complicated, and that’s probably why the court didn’t take it. They’re only taking easy cases this year.”
It all stems from a 2000 case tried in France, in which the Union of Jewish Students in France (UEJF) and the League Against Racism and Anti-Semitism (LICRA) sued Yahoo! for making its auction site available to French buyers of Nazi artifacts. The court ruled that Yahoo! would have to abide by the country’s strict anti-Nazi laws and either prohibit French users from accessing the auctions in question or suffer a 15 million dollar fine.
Yahoo! removed the auctions, but then sued UEJF and LICRA in California, claiming infringement of its US First Amendment rights. Yahoo! wanted the French ruling nulled, but eventually lost in a decision by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
However, the two French groups are afraid that Yahoo! can file a “tit for tat” suit against them in the US, and wanted the Supreme Court to definitively rule out that possibility. Schoenberg laments that the Supreme Court’s decision not to hear the case “makes no sense.” So far, no word from Yahoo!
Topics: Legal Issues, Yahoo! |