Martin Luther King, Jr.‘s legacy of advocating peace and justice was celebrated with a holiday yesterday.
The award for most unusual King Day activity goes to boxing impressario Don King, whom we presume has no relation to the civil rights leader. Don King’s production arm, KingVision Pay-Per-View, went to the Southern District of Texas yesterday — one of the few jurisdictions still open for business — and filed more than 20 lawsuits against local restaurant and bar establishments. At issue was not peace, but rather a fight, specifically the January 19, 2008 fisticuffs between light heavyweights Roy Jones, Jr. and Felix Trinidad.
With the three-year statute of limitations running down, KingVision sued more than 20 establishments for violating the Cable Communications Policy Act by allegedly intercepting the satellite feed of a closed-circuit television broadcast. The defendants are said to have show its own customers an unauthorized viewing of the boxing match. KingVision is seeking at least $170,000 in damages and injunctions prohibiting the showing of future telecasts in each of its lawsuits.
A fitting way to honor Martin Luther King, Jr.?
OK, probably not, although litigator Aaron Moss at Greenberg Glusker notes that Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech was hardly shown on television yesterday because of copyright issues. Many broadcast outlets couldn’t get clearance from the King estate. Interestingly, Moss looks back and finds that the first lawsuits for violating copyright in the speech didn’t come from the estate, but rather from Dr. King himself, who shortly after his famous 1963 speech, moved for a preliminary injunction preventing record companies from selling copies.
ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7qbvLpbCwp5%2BZv6a8zqurnqpemLyue8GuqqKmlajAcK7UrKCnnaOoeq%2Bx1qxmnaeeYriqusZmmp6klZe%2FosDEnWSmpJtitbC4yJ2YsmVnZ4R6hY4%3D