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Rather old - but always a good legal reference from 2000.
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IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS
EASTERN DIVISION
SUZE RANDALL PHOTOGRAPHY,
GENERAL MEDIA COMMUNICATIONS,
INC., WENDY M., and
SHANNON B.,
Plaintiff,
vs.
REACTOR, INC., MICHAEL SAENZ,
MAX SHERIDAN and DOES 1-10,
Defendants.
No. 99 C 7812
MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER
Plaintiffs sued the defendants for copyright infringement and for other
claims based on their use of copyrighted photographs on their internet
website relating to an adult entertainment business. Defendants were served
but they did not appear or respond. We earlier entered an injunction as a
result of that default, but we deferred entering a money judgment pending
further justification of the amounts claimed.
That justification has now been furnished. In the meantime, the corporate
defendant and Saenz have filed for protection in bankruptcy. We dismiss them
without prejudice and with leave to reinstate. Accordingly, we assess
damages only against defendant Max Sheridan.
According to the documented assertions of plaintiffs (and we have no reason
to doubt them), the individual defendants were the principals of the
corporation defendant controlling the website. They continued to use eleven
photographs, despite several cease-and-desist letters, deleted the
plaintiffs' copyright notices from the photographs, and asserted that the
corporate defendant had the full copyrights in the works and would
vigorously pursue any copyright violations.
That all adds up to $100,000 in statutory copyright infringement damages per
infringement for willful violations, up to $25,000 for each violation of
Copyright Information management tampering, up to $1,000 each for violation
of the Illinois Right of Publicity Statute, trebled as a sanction, together
with costs and attorneys' fees, (not including damage claims on various
other counts). Plaintiffs seek the maximum amount $1,407,000, plus
$16,171.14 in fees both because the documented infringements undoubtedly
understate by multiples the actual infringements and do not reflect
secondary publication through downloading by internet users and because of
the need to deter flagrant willful misuse. While we are sympathetic to
plaintiffs' concerns, we think that figure is excessive in the absence of
hard evidence of actual publication. We award $150,000 for copyright
infringement, $150,000 for the tampering, $22,000 for the state violation,
and $16,171.14 in fees, for a total of $338,171.14.
________________________________________
JAMES B. MORAN
Senior Judge, U.S. District Court
May 11, 2000.
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