Wow, they really screwed up. $3M is one of the bigger ones of these I can recall.
According to the FCC's notices linked on the page, they were selling at least 65 radios that weren't certified, and thus were illegal to sell. And 12 of those radios could transmit on frequencies the FAA uses.
Then they tried to ignore the FCC when it was investigating them, and didn't turn over all the information the FCC requested.
And then they made a bunch of bad arguments to try to get out of the fine. They tried to argue "no harm, no foul", since no one complained about interference. They tried to claim the 5th Amendment protected them (as a corporation) from self-incrimination, which thankfully is not what courts have said. And they tried to argue that they couldn't afford the fine, but didn't turn over financial records to support it.
If I were setting government policies, "no harm, no foul" would be a 100% legit defence to anything (as long as the people potentially being harmed were aware)
That starts to break down when people try and fail to commit crimes (attempted theft) or do something that only has terrible consequences a fraction of the time (drunk driving, using bands restricted for emergency use).
According to the FCC's notices linked on the page, they were selling at least 65 radios that weren't certified, and thus were illegal to sell. And 12 of those radios could transmit on frequencies the FAA uses.
Then they tried to ignore the FCC when it was investigating them, and didn't turn over all the information the FCC requested.
And then they made a bunch of bad arguments to try to get out of the fine. They tried to argue "no harm, no foul", since no one complained about interference. They tried to claim the 5th Amendment protected them (as a corporation) from self-incrimination, which thankfully is not what courts have said. And they tried to argue that they couldn't afford the fine, but didn't turn over financial records to support it.