Three landlords in two states just got the same warning: shut down the pirate radio signal on your property, or risk a $2.4 million penalty. But that threat is now at risk of being undercut after a Supreme Court ruling in June stripped the FCC of some bite.
The FCC’s Enforcement Bureau sent Notices of Illegal Pirate Radio Broadcasting to three property owners this week, in Cleveland, the Bronx, and Brooklyn, after agents traced unlicensed FM signals to their buildings. Each notice warns of a fine up to $2,453,218 under the PIRATE Act.
In Cleveland, agents confirmed on August 4 that a signal on 91.7 MHz was coming from a Bellaire Road property owned by A & O Trucking LLC. In the Bronx, agents confirmed on June 16 that a signal on 97.3 MHz was coming from a White Plains Road property; the notice is addressed to KTJ NY MGT LLC, though the letter’s own text identifies the owner as KTG NY MGT LLC. In Brooklyn, agents confirmed on May 27 that a signal on 99.9 MHz was coming from a President Street property owned by 1745 Realty NY LLC, with Beaumont NY Management listed as property manager.
Each owner has ten business days to prove the broadcasting has stopped and identify who was responsible. These are warning notices, not fines, and if the Bureau eventually moves to a formal forfeiture order against any of the three, this June’s Supreme Court ruling in FCC v. AT&T spells out what happens next. The Court ruled 8-1 that FCC forfeiture orders are constitutional but not binding on their own: the Commission cannot seize assets, charge interest, or penalize a company simply for refusing to pay.
If an owner ignores the fine, the Department of Justice has to sue in federal court, and that case proceeds as a trial de novo, with a jury, not the FCC, deciding the facts.
The ruling grew out of AT&T and Verizon’s challenges to multimillion-dollar data-privacy penalties, but it applies just as directly to pirate radio cases. The Court’s reasoning cut against a pending challenge from Florida pirate broadcaster Fabrice Polynice, who argued his $2.39 million PIRATE Act forfeiture violated his right to a jury trial. The justices disagreed, ruling that the availability of a jury trial in a later DOJ suit satisfies the Seventh Amendment.
