Less than a week after the conclusion of The Pirate Bay trial, a new controversy has surfaced over the judge's possible conflict of interests. It turns out that Judge Tomas Norstr�m—the judge who found The Pirate Bay defendants guilty and slapped them with jail time—is currently a member of the Swedish Copyright Association, an organization that works against piracy along with a number of entertainment industry members. As a result, lawyers for the defendants have made it clear that they will push for a retrial.

The Swedish media dug up information this week revealing that Norstr�m is a member of the Swedish Copyright Association along with Henrik Pont�n, Peter Danowsky and Monique Wadsted—individuals who represented the recording industry in The Pirate Bay trial. Additionally, Norstr�m also sits on the board of the Swedish Association for the Protection of Industrial Property, an advocacy group that pushes stricter copyright laws.

And these aren't just accusations. Norstr�m acknowledged to Sveriges Radio, as reported by The Local, that the findings are true; he just thought that it wouldn't be a problem. "My view has been that these activities do not constitute a conflict of interest," Norstr�m said.

Needless to say, the defendants feel otherwise. The lawyer representing The Pirate Bay's Peter Sunde (also known as brokep), Peter Althin, announced Thursday that he would seek to have the decision thrown out and the case revisited. "In the autumn I received information that a lay judge could have similar connections. I sent these to the court and the judge was excluded in order to prevent a conflict of interest. It would have been reasonable to then review this situation as well," Althin told The Local.

In fact, The Pirate Bay case has been laced with conflict of interest controversies for some time now. In addition to the current and lay judge's conflict of interests, in June of 2008, it was revealed that the police officer leading the investigation was also employed by Warner Bros. at the same time he was investigating the torrent kings.

The Pirate Party—a Swedish political party that is not directly related to The Pirate Bay, but supports copyright reform and privacy rights—agrees that this chain of events isn't flattering to Sweden's political system. "The copyright lobby has really managed to bring corruption to Sweden," Pirate Party chairman Rickard Falkvinge said in a statement.