Indiana Intellectual Property Law News
Northern District of Indiana – A trial attorney for Plaintiff ME2 Productions, Inc. of Carson City, Nevada filed two lawsuits in the Northern District of Indiana alleging copyright infringement of the action thriller “Mechanic: Resurrection.” One lawsuit was filed with the district court in Hammond while the other was filed in Fort Wayne.
Plaintiff contends that a “screener copy” of the movie was leaked and subsequently distributed illegally using BitTorrent, a file-sharing protocol. In each of the lawsuits, multiple unknown “Doe” Defendants are listed. They are accused of committing copyright infringement by participating “in a collective and interdependent manner with other Defendants via the Internet for the unlawful purpose of reproducing, exchanging, and distributing copyrighted material.” Plaintiff states that it has traced these Defendants to Indiana through the use of geolocation technology, which was used to determine the Internet Protocol (“IP”) addresses of each Defendant.
The movie, which is the sequel to the 2011 action film “Resurrection,” stars Jason Statham, Jessica Alba and Tommy Lee Jones. It has been registered with the U.S. Copyright Office under Registration No. PA-1-998-057.
Plaintiff seeks injunctive relief along with damages, costs and attorneys’ fees.
The first lawsuit was assigned to District Judge Philip P. Simon and Magistrate Judge Michael G. Gotsch, Sr. in the Northern District of Indiana and assigned Case No. 3:16-cv-00695-PPS-MGG.
The second lawsuit was assigned to District Judge Theresa L. Springmann and Magistrate Judge Michael G. Gotsch, Sr. in the Northern District of Indiana and assigned Case No. 3:16-cv-00697-TLS-MGG.