Carnahan Lawyers Move To Dismiss Fox Lawsuit
The Hollywood Reporter: "Carnahan has struck back, telling a Missouri District Court that Fox News sued before properly registering copyright on the clip. The Carnahan camp submitted a motion to dismiss the lawsuit on Friday, arguing that the popular cable news network was premature in initiating its copyright claim. Carnahan's lawyers say this is 'more than a technical failure.' Instead, the campaign contends that Fox couldn't complete a copyright application because it would have trouble claiming copyright on all elements of the clip that Carnahan used. The footage itself, it turns out, incorporates an image first broadcast on C-SPAN. The campaign says this may be proof that Fox abused the copyright registration process and filed a frivolous claim in bad faith."
From the motion:
Because the Fox Network commenced its copyright claim prematurely, the Court cannot grant the Fox Network relief on its copyright infringement claim and must therefore dismiss this claim. If this filing precondition problem is not resolved, the validity of this lawsuit and any rulings made herein may be questioned. The Carnahan Campaign has finished running, and thus ceased, television broadcasting of the advertisement in question, and if the case proceeds, it could place the Court and parties in the unusual situation of litigating a lawsuit never properly initiated as to broadcasts of a political advertisement that have already terminated.
Additionally, because no copyright registration is attached to the Complaint, the Fox Network has obscured the issue of the extent to which the materials used by the Carnahan Campaign in its television political advertisement even fall within the Fox Network's copyright.
Documents filed Friday may be found below the jump.
