Lawyers for Ford and General Motors and their respective...

Lawyers for Ford and General Motors and their respective suppliers Clarion and Denso got a 14-day deadline extension to Oct. 10 to answer recording industry allegations they violated the Audio Home Recording Act (AHRA) by shipping car infotainment systems with CD-copying hard drives without building the Serial Copy Management System into the devices (CED July 31 p5). Lawyers for the Alliance of Artists and Recording Companies, which filed the complaint July 25 in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, did not oppose the deadline-extension motion, which was filed Monday and granted Tuesday by U.S. District Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, court documents said (http://1.usa.gov/1pdd3Iu). “Good causes exist to grant this motion,” the documents said. They said more time was needed because Ford, Clarion, Denso and GM are trying to “coordinate in an effort to streamline their responses” to the complaint. The complaint “involves potentially complex issues of law” arising under the AHRA, and several lawyers for the defendants have only recently joined the case “and thus have been working to familiarize themselves with the claims and defenses in the action,” the motion said. It was the second time Jackson has granted the defendants more time to answer the complaint.