A federal court in Illinois declined to grant three rural incumbe...
A federal court in Illinois declined to grant three rural incumbent telcos an injunction blocking an Illinois Commerce Commission order requiring them to negotiate interconnection agreements with Sprint Communications for wholesale VoIP service. Harrisonville Telephone, Marseilles Telephone and Metamora…
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Telephone told the U.S. District Court in East St. Louis, Ill., that Sprint isn’t entitled to interconnection. They asserted Sprint isn’t a common carrier under federal law because it isn’t providing retail service, so Illinois regulators’ order is in clear violation of federal law, and they will suffer immediate and irreparable harm from the state’s unlawful order. Sprint sought interconnection so it could provide VoIP service to its retail partner, cable company Mediacom Communications, which would sell the phone service and handle billing and customer relations. The court (Case 3:06-CV-00073-GPM-DGW) said FCC rulings have held wholesale providers can be considered common carriers, Sprint provides indiscriminate service to the public through its retail partner Mediacom, and the service would not be possible without Mediacom’s participation. The court also said the rural telcos had failed to show a reasonable likelihood of winning the case on the merits.