Downloading Scottish gradmother gets 3 years probation

Anne Muir, the Scottish grandmother who was convicted of copyright theft for sharing over 30,000 music files via P2P networks earlier this year, has been sentenced to three year's probation. It was stressed in court that Muir was suffering from depresion and this drove her filesharing actions, rather than any intention to profit or to deny rights owners their profits. Welcoming the ruling, a spokesman for the BPI told reporters yesterday: "Today the court has recognised that illegal file-sharing on a massive scale is a serious matter and has imposed a sentence aimed at preventing such behaviour in future. We would like to thank the Strathclyde police and the procurator fiscal service in Ayr for their diligent work on this investigation".