STAND. COM. REP. NO. 1101

Honolulu, Hawaii

, 2005

RE: H.B. No. 164

H.D. 1

S.D. 1

 

 

Honorable Robert Bunda

President of the Senate

Twenty-Third State Legislature

Regular Session of 2005

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committees on Media, Arts, Science, and Technology and Commerce, Consumer Protection, and Housing, to which was referred H.B. No. 164, H.D. 1, entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO UNAUTHORIZED MOTION PICTURE RECORDING,"

beg leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to classify the unauthorized use of audiovisual recording devices in a movie theater while a motion picture is being exhibited as a misdemeanor.

Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from the Motion Picture Association of America, Inc., the Screen Actors Guild, and one individual.

Your Committees find that movie piracy through unauthorized audiovisual recordings made in movie theaters has resulted in losses to the motion picture industry, including actors, producers, and distributors of motion pictures. The illicitly copied movies are illegally duplicated, packaged, and distributed across the country and abroad, further aggravating industry losses.

Your Committees note that retail merchants are afforded protection from civil liability for detaining suspected shoplifters while awaiting the arrival of law enforcement officers. It is your Committees' intent to extend the same protections to movie theater owners or lessees, or their agents.

Your Committees therefore have amended this measure by reinstating the provisions that protect an authorized person from civil liability when taking reasonable action to detain an unauthorized user of an audiovisual recording device in a movie theater while awaiting the arrival of law enforcement officers, which were previously deleted in H.B. No. 164, H.D. 1.

As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Media, Arts, Science, and Technology and Commerce, Consumer Protection, and Housing that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 164, H.D. 1, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 164, H.D. 1, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Judiciary and Hawaiian Affairs.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Media, Arts, Science, and Technology and Commerce, Consumer Protection, and Housing,

____________________________

RON MENOR, Chair

____________________________

CAROL FUKUNAGA, Chair