Appeals Court Sustained District Judge’s Application Of Fogerty Factors, Finding That A Technical Defense “Win” Does Not Impede A Fee Award In This Area.
Defendants prevailed in Gold Value International Textile, Inc. v. Sanctuary Clothing, LLC, No. 17-55818 (9th Cir. June 4, 2019) (published) based on a “technical” defense that plaintiff’s copyright was invalid based on inaccurate information in its copyright application, with the merits determination affirmed on appeal. Losing plaintiff also appealed the district court’s award of $121,423.01 in attorney’s fees to the defense under 17 U.S.C. § 505 of the Copyright Act, applying the factors for such an award as enunciated in Fogerty v. Fantasy, Inc., 510 U.S. 517, 534 (1994).
The Ninth Circuit affirmed the fee award as well. It found that the district court did not abuse its discretion in concluding that (1) defendants prevailed; (2) they had modest success, albeit on a “technical” defense; (3) the result encouraged defendants to advance meritorious defenses in copyright cases; (4) plaintiff advanced some objectively unreasonable legal positions during the course of the litigation; (5) defendants were worthy of compensation for being the prevailing parties; and (6) the fee award would tend to deter litigants from pursing copyright cases based on invalid registrations. The federal appeals court also determined that it has never held that prevailing on a “technical” defense was precluded as a ground for awarding fees under 17 U.S.C. § 505, with this opinion cementing that reality.
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