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ALLEGATIONS OF COPYRIGHT AND TRADEMARK INFRINGEMENT Nancy Stouffer In 1999, American onetime author Nancy Stouffer quietly began to allege Copyright and Trademark Infringement by Rowling of her 1984 works ''The Legend of Rah and the Muggles'' and ''Larry Potter and His Best Friend Lilly''.1 The primary basis for Stouffer's case rests in her own purported invention of the word "Muggles", non-magical elongated Humanoids of sorts, in ''The Legend of Rah and the Muggles'', and Larry Potter, the title character of a series of activity booklets for children. Larry Potter is a bespectacled boy with dark, wavy hair. Rowling's Potter is characterised as having all of those qualities, though with unruly instead of wavy hair. Despite the confused reports of some news sites,2 Larry Potter is not a character in ''The Legend of Rah and the Muggles''; Stouffer contended, and still does to this day, that it is "the cumulative effect of all of it combined" with the other comparisons she lists on her website.3 Stouffer's books were only available for sale in the eastern United States between 1986 and 1987, and none were sold.4 Rowling has stated that she first visited the United States in 1998.5 Rowling, along with Scholastic Press (her American publisher) and Warner Bros. (holders of the series' film rights), pre-empted Stouffer with a suit of their own seeking a declaratory judgment that they had not infringed on any of Stouffer's works. During the course of the trial, it was proven "by clear and convincing evidence, that Stouffer has perpetrated a fraud on the Court through her submission of fraudulent documents as well as through her untruthful testimony," including changing pages years after the fact to retroactively insert the word "muggle".6 Her case was dismissed with prejudice and she was fined $50,000 for her "pattern of intentional bad faith conduct" in relation to her employment of fraudulent submissions, along with being ordered to pay a portion of the plaintiffs' legal fees.7 Stouffer appealed the decision in 2004, but the appeals court upheld the ruling, stating that "no reasonable juror could find a likelihood of confusion as to the source of the two parties' works". Claire Field In 2000, in the lead-up to the release of the first ''Harry Potter'' film, Warner Bros. , the film's distributor, sent a series of threatening letters to owners of ''Harry Potter'' fansites, demanding that, to protect their copyright, they hand over their domain names. The action resulted in negative publicity for the company when Claire Field, the then 15-year-old webmaster of the British fansite harrypotterguide.co.uk , was reduced to tears by what were described by her father as unnecessary bully tactics. Eventually the corporation backed down in the face of media opposition and declared that, as the site was non-commercial, it didn't violate their trademark.89 Various Chinese publishing houses In 2002 , an unauthorised Chinese-language sequel entitled Harry Potter And Leopard-Walk-Up-to-Dragon appeared for sale in the People's Republic Of China . The work of a Chinese Ghostwriter , the book contains the Verbatim text of J. R. R. Tolkien 's '' The Hobbit '' and characters from the works of other authors, including the title character from L. Frank Baum 's '' The Wizard Of Oz ''. Rowling's lawyers successfully took legal action against the publishers, who were forced to pay damages.10 Also in 2002, the China Braille Publishing House published ''Harry Potter and the Porcelain Doll''. It is estimated that there are fifteen million phoney ''Harry Potter'' novels circulating in China today.11 In 2007, Christopher Little , Rowling's literary agents, began to discuss the possibility of legal proceedings concerning a fake version of '' Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows '' that appeared in China ten days before the actual book's publication. Dimitry Yemets In 2003, courts in the 2003 . Accessed 21 March 2006 .12 Later that year, as the Dutch translation ''Tanja Grotter en de magische contrabas'' was still legal in Belgium, the Flemish publishers Roularta Books decided to print 1,000 copies (and no more) in order to let people decide whether it was Plagiarism , hoping that under those circumstances Rowling and her publishers would not sue. 'Tanja Grotter' wel in België te lezen , ''Nieuws.nl'', October 23, 2003 Rowling did not sue, but as there was a lot of interest in the book (Dutch people could buy the book by postal order from another Flemish publisher, Boekhandel VanIn) it was soon sold out. The books remain popular in Russia and have spawned several sequels, as well as numerous merchandise and adaptations.13 At least ten recognised Harry Potter Parodies are in circulation today, and have not faced legal injunction from Rowling or her publishers. One parody series, '' Barry Trotter '' by Michael Gerber, has to date sold over 700,000 copies in several countries.14 Preventive Maintenance Monthly In their May, 2004 issue, the US Army publication the Preventive Maintenance Monthly , which instructs soldiers on how to maintain their equipment, featured a spoof comic based on ''Harry Potter'', featuring a character named Topper who resided at Mogmarts School under Professor Rumbledore.15 The publication received notice from Rowling's lawyers that the comics breached copyright, though the magazine's editor, Ken Crunk, claimed that no violation had taken place, as "The drawings do not look like any of the characters from Harry Potter"16 Wyrd Sisters In 2005, after being offered CAD$50,000 by Warner Brothers , Canadian folk band The Wyrd Sisters undertook a legal action against Warner Brothers , Jarvis Cocker of Pulp , and Jonny Greenwood and Phil Selway of Radiohead , because of a scene in the '' Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire '' movie adaptation. In J.K. Rowling 's novel a band called the "Weird Sisters" plays at a special event in the story. Warner Brothers had considered using the name "The Weird Sisters" in the movie version of that scene. While negotiations to share the name with the Atlanta based band "Three Weird Sisters" were met with enthusiasm, similar negotiations between Warner Brothers and the "Wyrd Sisters" quickly broke down, and all plans to use the name in the movie were abandoned. Despite that decision, the Canadian band filed a CAD$40-million lawsuit against Warner in Ontario court, which included an attempt to block distribution of the film in Canada. The entire suit was dismissed in November, 2005. Additionally, in June, 2006, the band was ordered to pay Warner Bros. CAD$140,000 in legal costs stemming from the group's lawsuit.1718 eBay In 2007, Rowling launched a series of lawsuits against a number of users of the auction site EBay , alleging that they were selling illegally created E-books of her work.19 LEGAL INJUNCTIONS There have been a series of legal injunctions brought by Rowling and her publishers to ensure the books' secrecy before their launch. In their potentially sweeping powers over individual freedoms, these injunctions have drawn criticism from Civil Liberties campaigners. In 2003, Rowling and her publishers sought and got a groundbreaking injunction against “the person or persons who has or have physical possession of a copy of the said book or any part thereof without the consent of the Claimants”20. The ruling obtained, for the first time in British law, an injunction against unnamed or unknown individuals; before then, injunctions could only be obtained against named individuals. This principle was later used to stop a demonstration and the growth of a gypsy site. In 2006, pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline employed the injunction against anonymous animal rights campaigners who had sent threatening letters to their investors.21 The series garnered more controversy in 2005 with its sixth release, '' Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince '', when a Real Canadian Superstore grocery store accidentally sold several copies of the sixth Harry Potter book before the authorised release date. The Canadian publisher, Raincoast Books , obtained an Injunction from the Supreme Court Of British Columbia prohibiting the purchasers from reading the books in their possession. This sparked a number of news articles questioning the injunction's restriction on fundamental rights. Solicitors Fraser Milner and Casgrain have rebutted this in their analysis of the case, saying that the Canadian Charter Of Rights And Freedoms applies only to the government, not to private litigation, and does not offer any protection of the right to read in any case, and the innocent purchasers of the ''Harry Potter'' book had no more right to read it than if they had come into possession of someone's secret diary.22 Richard Stallman posted a statement on his blog calling for a boycott until the publisher issues an apology.23 In 2007, Scholastic Corporation threatened legal action against two booksellers, Levy Home Entertainment and DeepDiscount.com, for selling copies of the final novel, '' Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows '' before its release date of July 21. In an official statement, Scholastic made an appeal "to the Harry Potter fans who bought their books from DeepDiscount.com and may receive copies early requesting that they keep the packages hidden until midnight on July 21st."24 Customers who agreed not to read the book received a special Harry Potter t-shirt and a $50 coupon for Scholastic's online store. CRIMINAL PROSECUTION In June 2005, Aaron Lambert, a security guard at a book distribution centre in Corby , Northamptonshire , England , stole a number of pages from '' Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince '' six weeks before its intended publication date. He was arrested a day later after negotiations to sell them to John Askill, a journalist from '' The Sun '', went bad - Lambert reportedly fired a shot from his imitation Walther PPK pistol, though Mr. Askill was unharmed.25 At his trial the following October, Lambert pleaded guilty to threatening Mr. Askill, and also to attempting to blackmail ''Harry Potter'''s publishers, Bloomsbury .26 In January 2006, Lambert was sentenced to four and a half years in prison.27 LIBEL THREAT In July 2007, a dispute arose between ''Harry Potter'''s British publisher, Bloomsbury , and Asda , a British supermarket chain owned by the US corporation Wal-Mart . On July 15, a week before the release of the final ''Harry Potter'' novel, '' Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows '', Asda, which planned to sell the book as a Loss Leader at £8.87, or half Bloomsbury's Recommended Retail Price of £17.99 and below the Wholesale price of £9.89,28 issued a press release accusing Bloomsbury of unfairly fixing their prices. Asda spokesman Peter Pritchard claimed that Bloomsbury was "holding children to ransom" and that, "It seems like Bloomsbury need to do a Quid-ditch as they have sent their prices up north on the Hogwarts Express . By setting the RRP at this level can only be seen {Link without Title} as blatant profiteering on their part."29 Pritchard went on to say that Asda were acting to "champion the right of young readers," and that the RRP was "twice the average child's pocket money and £5 more than the average children's bestseller." Two days later, Bloomsbury responded that the claims were "potentially libellous" and that "Asda's latest attempt to draw attention to themselves involves trying to leap on the ''Harry Potter'' bandwagon. This is just another example of their repeated efforts of appearing as Robin Hood in the face of controversy about their worldwide group, which would suggest they are perceived as more akin to the Sheriff Of Nottingham . Loss leaders were invented by supermarkets and have nothing to do with Bloomsbury Publishing or ''Harry Potter'' and we deeply regret having been dragged into their price-wars." They stated that the price hike of £1 from the previous ''Harry Potter'' novel was due to it having been printed on recycled paper. "There is a price to be paid by the consumer for environmental best practice," a Bloomsbury spokeswoman said.30 Bloomsbury CEO Nigel Newton said, "They've unleashed a very disingenuous, self-interested attack on us. This is complete nonsense and all they're doing is grandstanding as they've done on the price of aspirin and bread. They try to turn it into a big deal as though it's a moral crusade for them, but it's nothing of the kind." That same day, Bloomsbury cancelled all Asda's orders of ''Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows'', or roughly 500,000 copies, citing unpaid bills from the company totalling £38,000 for unauthorised returns of the sixth ''Harry Potter'' book. "The two matters are completely unrelated," said a Bloomsbury spokeswoman, "We decided today that we couldn't risk having arrears with anybody." The dispute had been "going on a while - going on for weeks actually."31 Asda responded that Bloomsbury owed them £122,000 ("for pulping and for other book trade issues and work we have done for them") and that, as one company spokesman claimed, "It just seems funny that after we expose the potty Potter price hike, Bloomsbury are trying everything they can to stop kids getting hold of ''Harry Potter'' at a price they can afford." Asda paid the bill within hours, and claimed that Bloomsbury would be in breach of contract if it did not allow the store to sell its books. However, Bloomsbury claimed that the block on Asda's orders was still in place as, "Unfortunately, we've now had to initiate a significant libel claim against them. That matter will have to be dealt with. If they want their 500,000 books, they'll have to come and make peace with us... It could be good news for all their disappointed customers, because they don't have to go to a soulless Asda shed to buy their book and they can share the magic of Harry Potter at an independent or specialist bookstore instead." Upon receipt of Bloomsbury's legal letter, Asda responded that, "There is nothing defamatory in our press release. Everything there is factual. It is a commentary on how we see things." Said another Asda spokesperson, "If they don't supply us with the books, it will have a massive implication and {Link without Title} a breach of contract - but I don't think they will do that." Later that day, however, Asda released a statement retracting its original comment: "We apologise unreservedly to Bloomsbury for {Link without Title} press release dated July 15 and withdraw our statement. We look forward to a good relationship with Bloomsbury going forward, including selling the latest ''Harry Potter'' book from 00:01am BST on Saturday 21 July and many other Bloomsbury books in the future".32 In response, Bloomsbury lifted the block and Asda was allowed to sell its books. The original press release was then expunged.33 The rationale behind Asda's initial press release remains uncertain. Neill Denny, commentator for thebookseller.com, opined that "the whole episode has the whiff of a badly-conceived PR stunt by ill-briefed senior executives at Asda out of touch with the subtleties of the book world."34 Ralph Baxter of Publishing News concurred: "For Asda... it may be seen as mission accomplished, a high-risk strategy to maximise publicity for its ''Harry Potter'' offer rewarded with television, radio, internet and newspaper coverage. And the association of Asda with low prices has no doubt been entrenched in a few more minds." SEE ALSO
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