Putting aside any legitimate legal standings, I’m starting to think Stan Lee’s retirement plan is filing lawsuits against anyone making a movie with any characters he was associated with.

Correction: As one commentor below notes, the lawsuit is being filed by Stan Lee Media, not Stan Lee the individual. Several news stories (including the NY Post story I linked to) make it appear Stan is behind the lawsuits, but most others clarify that it is his old media company.

Last week the New York State Supreme Court, New York County, dismissed all claims in a million dollar lawsuit brought by the Graphic Artists Guild (GAG) against the Illustrators’ Partnership of America (IPA) and five named individuals.

In the lawsuit, GAG asserted claims for defamation and interference with contractual relations, alleging that IPA had interfered with a “business relationship” GAG had entered into that enabled GAG to collect orphaned reprographic royalties derived from the licensing of illustrators’ work. GAG alleged that efforts by IPA to create a collecting society to return lost royalties to artists “interfered” with GAG’s “business” of appropriating these orphaned fees.

In her decision, Judge Debra James ruled that statements made by the Illustrators’ Partnership and the other defendants were true; that true statements cannot be defamatory; that illustrators have a “common interest” in orphaned income; and that a “common-interest privilege” may arise from both a right and a duty to convey relevant information, however contentious, to others who share that interest or duty.

Regarding a key statement at issue in the lawsuit: that GAG had taken over one and a half million dollars of illustrators’ royalties “surreptitiously,” the judge wrote:
“Inasmuch as the statement [by IPA] was true, [GAG]‘s claim cannot rest on allegations of a reckless disregard of whether it was false or not. Truthful and accurate statements do not give rise to defamation liability concerns.”

And she noted:

“The plaintiff Guild has conceded that it received foreign reproductive royalties and that it does not distribute any of the money to artists.”

Labor Department filings provided as evidence to the court document that between 2000 and 2007, GAG collected at least $1,581,667 in illustrators’ reprographic royalties. GAG admitted to having collected similar royalties since 1996. GAG’s officers have repeatedly refused to disclose how much money their organization has received to date or how the money has been spent.

DUTY AND COMMON INTEREST
The judge concluded that this situation justified an assertion of common interest by IPA. This means that “the party communicating [relevant information] has an interest or has a duty” to convey that information truthfully to others “having a corresponding interest or duty”:

“The duty need not be a legal one, but only a moral or social duty. The parties need only have such a relation to each other as would support a reasonable ground for supposing an innocent motive for imparting the information. Here the plaintiff Guild’s factual allegations demonstrate that the defendants’ statements were both true, and fall within the parameters of the common-interest privilege.”

We hope this decision will end the two and a half years of litigation during which GAG pursued its claims against IPA and artists Brad Holland, Cynthia Turner and Ken Dubrowski of IPA, as well as attorney Bruce Lehman, former Commissioner of the US Patent Office and Terry Brown, Director Emeritus of the Society of Illustrators.

Idaho Statesman reports that in addition to the cartoon porn, Kutzner had 500 pictures of teenage females (but couldn’t be proven that they were under 18) and 8,000 files of child erotica
. Investigators believe Kutzner had downloading child porn for at least eight years, but because he used software to delete the files before the search warrant was executed, he couldn’t be charged for greater crimes.

“The CBLDF legal team has been tracking trends in customs here in the U.S. and abroad that show authorities searching, and,in some cases, seizing the computers, portable devices, storage devices, and other items of travelers who have adult comics material stored on those devices,” Brownstein told Comic Book Resources. “The ACLU is tracking similar customs abuses from a privacy point of view. There’s a recent incident about which we’re not at liberty to discuss specifics involving this trend, where we were asked to provide information and letters of support. Because this is a pending matter, I’m not at liberty to discuss further specifics at this time.”

The U.S. Attorney’s office said Steven Kutzner, 33, had downloaded more than 70 animated cartoon pornographic images on his computer. Many of them depicted child characters from The Simpsons.

Kutzner was a former middle school teacher at Lake Hazel Middle School in Meridian. He resigned immediately after the search warrant was served at his home.

Sentencing will be held in January. He faces a maximum of 10 years in federal prison and up to $250,000 in fines.

A failed GOP candidate is suing nine journalists for $1 million each and has named The Journal News editorial cartoonist Matt Davies as one of the nine. The suit alleges that the nine journalists “defamed his character, ruined his reputation and caused him emotional distress.”

Russell, who has run for Congress five times, including his latest candidacy, last month lost the GOP’s backing in his race against Democratic Rep. Nita Lowey.

…

According to the lawsuit filed in state Supreme Court, Russell challenged a variety of news accounts that called his views and writings racist. He accused the media, which he labeled the “liberal media,” of attacking and undermining the campaigns of “patriotic candidates.”

“It’s been reckless and it’s been false, and that’s why we’re filing this lawsuit,” he said.

The newspaper editor and vice president has called the suit “without merit.”

I need help compiling a list of television shows and movies where animals and humans talk to each other without any explanation of how it’s possible (magic, etc.). So far I have:

• Stuart Little
• Family Guy
• Tales of Despereaux
• Dilbert (tv show)
• Mr. Ed

I’m also be interested in well known comic strips with the same set up.

Any suggestions?

Reprographic royalties are money collected from universities, government entities and corporations for a blanket license to copy printed matter. As a cartoonist with work published in the US and abroad, you may be entitled to some of the money. I made a pitch at this year’s Reubens for cartoonists to join ASIP, the organization that would be responsible for collecting the funds on your behalf. The NCS itself is a member of ASIP, and Page 4 of the latest issue of The Cartoon!st has a pitch from the NCS board for individual members to join. Mark Simon has just written a long piece at Animation World Network providing detailed background on the issue.

I urge all U.S. cartoonists (who own at least some of their published work) to join ASIP by completing and sending in the form at www.asip-repro.org/join.html It’s not only free, someday you might even receive a small check!