By Jason Tompkins and Jonathan Hoffmann ( June 27, 2017, 4:01 PM EDT) -- If the court had assessed full statutory damages and penalties for each violation of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act and telemarketing sales rule (TSR) proven by the plaintiffs in a recent case against Dish Network LLC, damages would have exceeded $783 billion ($783,350,422,000 — to be exact).[1] The court had very little difficulty determining that amount violated due process as a penalty "so severe and oppressive as to be wholly disproportioned to the offense and obviously unreasonable."[2] Ultimately, the court assessed a penalty that accounted for 20 percent of Dish's 2016 after-tax profits, $280 million.[3]...