Second US state fights Microsoft ruling
Microsoft faces yet another legal challenge to the antitrust settlement in the US, with the state of West Virginia joining Massachusetts in a decision to appeal the federal court ruling.
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The challenge comes after US District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly last month rejected efforts by nine US states, including West Virginia and Massachusetts to break Microsoft up.
Darrell McGraw, attorney general for West Virginia, said the state is appealing against the decision because the sanctions against Microsoft were not harsh enough.
‘We have preserved our appeal. No reputable government should plea poverty and allow an adjudicated lawbreaker to retain their ill-gotten gains,’ he said in a statement.
Specifically, he said the anti-trust settlement failed to impose sanctions that would ‘remedy the unlawful co-mingling of computer software code that the federal court of appeals specifically agreed was an antitrust violation’.
Massachusetts announced its intention to appeal earlier in the week, but none of the other nine states involved in the original action are expected to follow.