landlord liability for pirate radio

This week, the FCC released two Notices of Apparent Liability proposing to impose big fines on two pirate radio operators.  Using the enforcement tools – particularly the higher fines – authorized by the PIRATE Act passed by Congress in 2020, the FCC proposed a to impose a fine of $2,316,034 on one alleged operator of a pirate radio station in the New York City area, and a fine of $80,000 fine on another operator of a pirate station in Oregon.  We’ve written in the past about the FCC sending warning letters to landowners and pirate radio operators threatening big fines if they don’t cease operations (or, for landowners, if they don’t force their tenants to cease illegal operations).  But, as noted in the FCC’s Press Release, this is the first time since the adoption of the PIRATE Act that the FCC has gone beyond the warning phase to issue these notices of multimillion dollar “forfeitures” (fines) on pirate operators and, in the New York case, use the full force permitted by the law to levy the multimillion dollar fine.  Theoretically, the alleged pirates could respond to the Notices and contest the fines, but the FCC’s decisions seem adamant that these operators should be paying a substantial penalty.  It is probably no coincidence that these Notices were issued a little over a month after the FCC sent its annual report to Congress on its activities under the PIRATE Act, promising increased efforts to combat pirate radio in the new year. 

The New York pirate appears particularly brazen, prompting the largest fine yet levied against a pirate radio operator.  According to the Notice of Apparent Liability, two individuals have operated a pirate radio station in the New York borough of Queens for over a decade.  In 2013, the FCC’s Enforcement Bureau issued three Notices of Unauthorized Operation to the operators, warning them that their operations were illegal and needed to stop.  In 2014, agents personally confronted one of the operators who admitted ownership of the equipment, and again told him to stop operating.  When operations continued, a proposed fine of $20,000 was issued in 2015, but never paid or contested.   In 2016, as operations had continued, Federal Marshalls seized the station’s equipment.  Yet the pirate came back and continued operations – even using a website and social media to promote programs hosted by the two individuals named in this week’s Notice.  The FCC emphasized that the repeated, ongoing nature of the violation even after multiple warnings and prior government action prompted its substantial fine.  The PIRATE statute limits fines to $2,316,034 – otherwise, the FCC would have proposed a fine ten times larger, given the nature of the violation and the pirate’s apparent disregard of the FCC’s prior attempts to enforce the law.

Continue Reading Two Million Dollar Fine for Pirate Radio – Don’t Cross the Commission Again After You’ve Been Caught Once, Especially as More Enforcement Appears to be on the Way

Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the past week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.

  • The effective date of a recently adopted FCC Report and Order aimed at making emergency alerts delivered over television and

Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the past week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.

  • On October 17, Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI), Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), and Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-CA) introduced the Identifying Propaganda

Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the past  week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.

Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the last week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.

  • The FCC issued its Notice of Proposed Rulemaking proposing the annual regulatory fees to be paid by September 30, the

Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the last week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.

  • Follow field testing by GeoBroadcast Solutions of its zonecasting system, the FCC opened a new comment period for interested parties

The FCC yesterday made public four letters to landowners warning them that there were unlicensed FM radio operations coming from their properties and warning that, if the transmissions continued past the 10-business day response period, the landowners could be held liable for penalties up to $2,000,000 for the unlicensed operations coming from their properties.  The

Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the last week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.

  • We noted last week that updated fees for broadcast applications would take effect April 19. After clarification from the FCC,

Here are some of the regulatory developments in the last week of significance to broadcasters -and a few dates to watch in the week ahead – with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.

  • The FCC issued an order that locks in its

The PIRATE Act, to crack down on pirate radio, passed the Senate this week after having passed in the House of Representatives last year.  It now goes to the President for signature.  We’ve written about this legislation several times before (see for instance, our articles here and here).  In this final version, it provides more tools for the FCC to crack down on pirate radio operators more quickly, plus it imposes obligations on the FCC to make more regularized enforcement efforts against pirate radio operators, although without necessarily providing any more resources with which to do so.

The bill increases the fine for pirate radio to a maximum of $100,000 per day of operation, to a maximum of $2,000,000.  Fines can be imposed on anyone who “knowingly does or causes or suffers to be done any pirate radio broadcasting.”  This would seemingly allow the FCC to go after not just the operators themselves, but also those who “suffer to be done” any pirate radio operation, which could possibly implicate landlords who knowingly allow pirate radio operations on their premises, consistent with some recent FCC cases (see, for instance, the one we wrote about here).  In addition, the bill allows the FCC to immediately issue a Notice of Apparent Liability (a notice of a proposed fine) without having to first issue a Notice of Violation (a notice suggesting that there is a violation of the rules, but allowing the person accused of violating the rule to first respond before the FCC can issue the proposed fine).  The accused party will still be able to argue that no fine should be imposed when it receives the Notice of Apparent Liability (e.g., the party could argue that it had a license or that it did not really broadcast at all, or at a power level that requires FCC approval), but the two-step process currently needed before issuing a proposed fine would no longer be required, thus speeding up enforcement efforts. 
Continue Reading PIRATE Act Passes Senate, and Now on to the President for Signature – Provides for Big Fines and Enforcement Sweeps in Big Markets