Comment by MrJohz

You are talking about lending, but I'm not really sure why because it's not that relevant to the case.

If you photocopy a single page from a library book, this is often (but not always) fair use because you're copying only a limited part of the book. In the same way, you can quote a section or paragraph of a book under fair use. You cannot copy the whole book, though. Therefore:

> Even if the copy they make falls under fair use and the person who does own that copy of the book has no objection to their doing this?

If the copy had been made under fair use, then yes, this wouldn't be illegal. But it wasn't, because it was a reproduction and distribution of the entire book by someone who did not have the right to do that.