UNBIASED - LAW: Week in Review: August 1, 2022

Episode Date: August 8, 2022

Al-Qaeda Leader Ayman al-Zawahiri Killed in Airstrike (2:18)Kansas Votes to Reject "Value Them Both" Constitutional Amendment (6:35)Jury Enters $49.3M Verdict Against Alex Jones in Defamation Lawsuit (13:02)Brittney Griner Sentenced to 9 Years in Russian Prison (24:44)Netflix Sues Two TikTok Creators over Unofficial Bridgerton Musical (30:16) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Please gamble responsibly. Gambling problem? For free assistance, call the Connex Ontario helpline at 1-866-531-2600. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. You are listening to the Jordan is My Law podcast. This is your host Jordan and I give

you the legal analysis you've been waiting for. Here's the deal. I don't care about your political views, but I do ask that you listen to the facts, have an open mind and think for yourselves. Deal? Oh, and one last thing. I'm not actually a lawyer. Welcome back to the Jordan is my lawyer podcast. It's Monday and we're diving into current affairs and the law. A lot has happened since last week's episode so we have a lot of ground to cover today but just a few things that I wanted to bring to your attention quickly. I now have a set schedule for the podcast so Monday mornings at 6 a.m. will be your weekly current affairs in the law. As always, my unbiased fact-based approach doesn't matter where I stand, doesn't matter where you stand, all that matters is we're educated. And

then every Tuesday you can expect a true crime episode. We call this True Crime Tuesdays, but my true crime is actually a bit different than everyone else's true crime or like other true crime podcasts that you may have listened to. Not only will I cover the truest of true crime stories, but I'm also going to throw in some episodes about the death penalty and executions in the United States because ultimately the death penalty and true crime go hand in hand. You don't get the death penalty without lending your hand to some true crime at some point, right? So my first true crime episode was last week. Go listen to that if you haven't already. I talked about the most recent execution in the United States, what he did to get there, why his conviction was overturned at one point, the

method of execution, the thoughts of the victim's family, and much, much more. So you'll definitely want to listen to that. And on tomorrow's episode, I talk about Lacey Peterson, whose husband was convicted of her murder, but who now has a hearing for a retrial coming up this year. So with those housekeeping matters out of the way, let's jump right into it. The first story of the day is that on August 1st, President Biden announced from his blue room balcony that the United States

had successfully concluded an airstrike in Kabul, Afghanistan that killed the Al-Qaeda leader Aman al-Zawahiri. According to the president, al-Zawahiri was bin Laden's number two man, was bin Laden's deputy at the time of the 9--11 attack and was deeply involved in planning 9-11 al-zawahiri was a mastermind in the bombing of the uss coal in 2000 which killed 17 american sailors he played a key role in the bombing of the u.s embassies in kenya and tanzania killing 224 since bin laden was killed 11 years agoawahiri has allegedly been the leader of Al-Qaeda. See, that's why I feel like this guy was bin Laden's number one man, not number two man. Al-Zawahiri had even made videos in recent weeks calling for his followers to attack the United

States and our allies. So apparently Zaw what here he's been sought after for a pretty long time, first by President Bush and then Obama and then Trump. But finally, earlier this year, the U.S. intelligence community located him in downtown Kabul, where he had moved to reunite with members of his immediate family. President Biden said that, quote, after carefully considering the clear and convincing evidence of his location i authorized a precision strike that would remove him from the battlefield once and for all and after being advised that the conditions were optimal i gave the final approval to go get him and the mission was a success none of his family members were hurt and there were no civilian casualties so i think what he

means when he says conditions were optimal was that maybe al-zawahiri was alone like maybe his family members weren't home or something no one else was around and that's why conditions were optimal not sure but that is what he said nonetheless and here's the thing it doesn't matter where you stand politically to be happy about this news which is refreshing i originally posted a brief version of this story on tiktok like a shortened uh condensed version when it originally broke on august 1st and i had some people commenting that al-zawahiri had been killed years ago and that biden was just looking for praise and i wouldn't have thought twice about it if only one person commented, but multiple people said the same thing. And here's what I have to say

about that. Whether or not you believe al-Zawahiri was killed by our current president, a prior president, or some outside force, we can all share the feeling of joy and happiness that al-Zawahiri is dead, right? If you think this is old news, great, but it's good news nonetheless. And whether or not you consider it to be a Biden victory, it's still a victory. Think of it as a 9-11 victory as well. As Americans in such a divided country, we need to find reasons to come together and this is a great opportunity. President Biden ended his remarks by saying, today we remember the lost. We commit ourselves to the safety of living and we pledge that we shall never waver from defending our nation and its people we will never we will

never give up so i hope our nation never gives up i don't think our nation will ever give up because we have the strongest nation in the world right so that is that uh al-zawahiri is dead good news great news and if you're interested in reading the press release from the white house i did include it on my website so with most of the sources i cite you can go to my website jordanismylawyer.com on the episode description page this will be episode seven and when you scroll down all of my sources will be there and so i will include this press release there so you can read it for yourself it's worth reading and I always recommend obviously looking at sources yourself because that is ultimately how we learn so moving on to topic number two of the day on August 2nd the people of

Kansas took to the polls to vote on a proposed amendment to its state constitution called the Value Them Both Amendment, which would remove the existing constitutional right to abortion. 59% of voters rejected the amendment, which means the right to abortion remains guaranteed by the state constitution. Had this proposed amendment passed, the right to abortion would not have been guaranteed by the state constitution, and it would have given the legislature the opportunity to restrict or ban abortions. So although the Supreme Court overturned the right to abortion on a federal level under the United States constitution, states can still individually protect the right to abortion under their own state

constitution so in this case kansas already had a state constitutional right to abortion not all states do and they were voting to either keep the guarantee or get rid of it and i just want to reiterate because when i posted that t video on this topic, I had someone comment. I'm going to read the comment. It says, hey, impartial attorney, your opening statement is absolutely incorrect. Either you are a very poor lawyer or you didn't read the proposed amendment. It merely gave legislatures the ability, it merely gave legislators the ability to vote on the matter of abortion, nothing to do with automatically banning it. Okay, just for the record, I never said this, but just in case you're confused, if this

amendment was passed, abortion wouldn't automatically be banned. It would simply just leave this issue up to the legislature to decide. And then on the flip side of that, just because this right was upheld doesn't mean that women can now get abortions whenever they want up until the day that they give birth. Despite abortion being a constitutional right in Kansas, the state can still place restrictions on abortion that serve the interests of the state. So the state's interest is kind of always considered in these instances, even when it's a protected right. So in Kansas's case, women cannot get an abortion later than 20 to 22 weeks, depending on their menstrual cycle.

This timeline took effect on June 28th, 2022, following Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood versus Casey being overturned. And had the proposed amendment passed, it's likely that abortions would have been banned at any stage of pregnancy, except for in cases of emergencies and possibly in the case of rape or incest. But, you know, obviously it's hard to tell. You never know what could have potentially happened. But since this amendment was rejected, this 20 to 22 week mark will stand so when when kansans went to the polls this is the statement that was printed on the ballot with the amendment as a whole so they got to see everything they got to see what the change to the constitution would look

like and then there was an explanatory statement and this is what the explanatory statement said quote a vote for the value than both amendment would reserve to the people of Kansas through their elected state legislatures the right to pass laws to regulate abortion because there is no Kansas constitutional right to abortion or to require the government funding of abortion. A vote against the value than both amendment would make no changes to the Constitution of the state of Kansas and could prevent the people through their elected state legislatures from regulating abortion in many circumstances. It would leave in place the newly discovered right to abortion first recognized in 2019, end quote. So that is the explanation that voters saw on their ballots before voting or at the time of voting, I guess I should say. And like I said, 59% of voters

voted to reject this amendment and maintain that constitutional right to abortion. This result came as a surprise to many since Kansas is a conservative state. Even John Epley, a Republican representative in Kansas, said he was, quote, kind of almost shocked over these results. So I think this goes to show that the majority of people, whether that be a simple majority or a super majority, are able to think freely and think for themselves and don't necessarily tie themselves to one party or the other. Because whether you're pro-life or pro-choice, if you yourself have an open mind, you have to appreciate the fact that Americans aren't just picking a side and sticking to it. They're actually

using their own minds and their own opinions to vote on controversial issues regardless of what their political affiliation says. And that's exactly what makes our country so great, right? Like that's exactly what makes America America. That we as the people have a voice. And whether or not we agree with everyone else's voice and everyone else's opinion, we still have a voice nonetheless. So the fact that a red state was able to come out and vote in favor of upholding the state constitutional right to abortion is something that it seems we haven't seen in a long time. It seems that in recent years, a lot of these issues, and not surprisingly so really, but a lot of these controversial issues have kind of fallen in favor of whichever political party has the majority, right? So it's just nice to see a little bit of differentiation, I guess, whether or not you agree

with the right to abortion. It is nice to see that people are thinking outside of their box, so to speak. Per usual, I included links to the proposed amendment as well as an article about the history of abortion rights in Kansas. If you're interested in giving those a look, it's always interesting. I think it's always interesting to read about the abortion rights history because it kind of gives context as to like why certain bans were put in place or why the freedom was given like it's it's always nice to see the reasoning behind why and the stories that led up to these events and these changes so I do have that again you can find those links on my website jordanismylawyer.com on the episode 7 web page okay I am sure you've heard the name Alex Jones in the news lately, but if you

haven't, I'm here to recap for you. I also, if you're one of those people who didn't know who he was, did not know who he really was before any of this, so you're not alone. I think I had heard his name in the past, but that was the extent of it. Anyway, Alex Jones is the host of his own TV show, The Alex Jones Show, as well as the host and creator of his website called InfoWars. He is an alt-right-wing conservative and conspiracy theorist, and I know we like to leave politics out of things, but he actually self-proclaims himself as these things, so it's an objective fact. He's already been banned from YouTube, Facebook, and Spotify for violating hate speech policies. He's

a pretty controversial guy. You either love him or you hate him, like he's one of those that it's kind of like there's not really any middle ground there but being the conspiracy theorist that he is he often throws around some pretty bizarre theories one of them being that the sandy hook school shooting was a hoax by the federal government to crack down on gun rights and that the parents of the children that were killed were actually just actors and had faked their children's deaths. The Sandy Hook school shooting, for those of you who may not be super familiar, it took place at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut on December 14, 2012. 20 children and six staff members were killed. It was the deadliest school shooting in the history of the United States. Since his original theory, Jones has conceded that Sandy Hook was 100% real.

Despite this though, Jones spreading these false theories caused his fans to do some crazy things because like anyone that has a platform, he too has fans. Regardless of how extreme his views might be, he has fans. Anyone on the platform has fans. So his fans did some wild things like some of them sent death threats to the parents of the children accusing them of faking their children's deaths. One of the parents who actually was not involved in this lawsuit said in an interview in 2018 that she had moved nearly 10 times since the shooting and lived in hiding. And each time she would move, conspiracy theorists would publish her new home address and she would just continue to get death threats.

Could you imagine people just accusing you of faking your child's death and you can never escape it? Now note that in this particular case, Jones, he's already been found liable for defamation. So he was already sued. He was already found liable. This recent trial that's been in the news was strictly to determine how much he owed the victims or the plaintiffs. So originally, the families of 10 Sandy Hook victims sued Jones in four separate lawsuits. The case has never made it to a jury, actually, because Jones was found liable by default because over the course of four years of litigation, he refused to turn over court-ordered documents. Now, let me tell you something as a lawyer.

If a court orders you to turn over documents, if a court orders you to do anything, you do that. You don't go against what the court says. So after four years and him refusing to turn over these court documents, the judge entered a default judgment against him essentially and found him liable for defamation. Now though, even though he's been found liable for the defamation, they have to determine damages. So how much he owes these families for his actions. This past week, the first of three trials took place. This one happened to take place in Austin, Texas. The other two are scheduled for September, but are actually

currently on hold because he filed for bankruptcy just before this most recent trial was set to start. Bankruptcy is a good way to halt legal proceedings against you, just so you know, in case you didn't. But since this trial was just about to start, it continued. So I think jury selection was on a Monday, and by Thursday, the jury awarded $4.1 million in compensatory damages to the parents of one of the victims. Then on Friday, the jury awarded the parents $45.2 million in punitive damages. This is just one set of parents. So I mentioned before, there were 10 families that filed suit against him, but this is just one family. So let's talk about the difference really quick between punitive and compensatory damages because I know it can be a bit confusing. Compensatory is meant to compensate the plaintiff.

So it's a good way to remember it. Compensatory, compensate. It's literally why it's named compensatory, but this can be for pain and suffering, emotional distress, lost wages, medical expenses, things of that nature. Anything that will compensate the plaintiff for something lost. Punitive damages, on the other hand, are meant to punish and deter future behavior. Some states cap punitive damages, Texas being one of them. The Texas statute actually says that punitive damages are capped at the greater of $200,000 or two times the amount of economic damages plus the amount equal to non-economic damages up to $750,000. And that sounds a bit confusing. Essentially, what you need to know is that compensatory damages, those damages that are meant to compensate the party, are split up into non-economic and economic damages. And that's what

that statutory language is referring to. Economic damages are those damages that can be calculated, such as lost wages. Non-economic damages cannot be calculated, such as pain and suffering. However, there is a bit of confusion when it comes to the cap on Texas punitive damages. As you guys know, I'm an attorney in Florida, not in Texas, so I'm not super familiar with it, but I have read and heard conflicting things. So as an example, the statute says exactly what I just told you, but the attorney for the parents of the victim, the parents that sued Alex Jones, that attorney was actually interviewed and said that the judge is actually the one that determines the punitive damages award and it's based on a reasonableness standard.

So maybe the judge finds that punitive damages in an amount three times what compensatory damages are is reasonable, but not punitive damages that are 15 times what compensatory damages are. So it's not that clear what punitive damages will be capped at, but what is clear is that Alex Jones's attorney will now file a motion to reduce the punitive damages. And then from there, the judge can decide what to reduce them to. Now, the parents originally sought $150 million in damages from Jones. Clearly, the jury thought that was a bit much. And then just to kind of touch a bit more on that punitive and compensatory damages thing, mostly punitive, Jamie Abrams, who's a law professor at American University, was interviewed by Bloomberg Law in regards to this

particular case and said that punitive damages are typically more of a bellwether or a barometer of where we are culturally. They're more iconic messages sending verdicts from the public to the defendant directly. And so on that front, this trial is uniquely interesting because it really is a political barometer of how much misinformation the public is willing to accept. But that statement makes me want to relay a question to you because do you think that this award award do you think that was a political barometer of how much misinformation the public is willing to accept or do you think it was more about Jones's statement being so insensitive and outlandish that the jury wanted to punish him for it it can certainly be a little bit of both but it's worth thinking about obviously I would love for it to be that barometer that

Jamie's talking about of people just so being so over the bullshit and the lack of fact checking but I think there's more to it than that but I don't know I'm just curious like what do you guys think do you do you think it's an indication of the public just being so over misinformation or like I said do you think it's more about his statement just being so over misinformation? Or like I said, do you think it's more about his statement just being so insensitive and crazy that people are like, no, you need to be punished for this? Or it can be a combination of both. Okay, so then before we move on to the next topic, let's briefly discuss what it means now that he declared bankruptcy. So just because he declared bankruptcy doesn't mean the parents of this child are SOL. There's going to be hearings

to determine the assets that Jones does have. His finances will be dug into a bit to ensure there aren't assets hiding somewhere. If he really doesn't have any money, that's when the parents of the victims could go after his properties and whatever assets he does have. And then going forward in the future, whenever he purchases a new asset, let's say like a new home or something, a lien will be attached to that asset. And it will essentially become a chase to recoup whatever money that these people are owed. So the parents of this child will become the creditors. And now Jones is the debtor and as creditors uh this this these two individuals can go after him for whatever assets he has now or he has in the future

and then the last thing I will say just from a legal standpoint is that it's kind of unfortunate that this case proceeded in the way that it did as far as Jones never really being heard in court and him automatically being found liable not that I'm not saying I don't agree that what he did was wrong what I'm saying is it kind of took away the opportunity to establish precedent surrounding misinformation and conspiracy theories in regard to free speech. Because this is kind of one of the first cases we've seen like this, or at least we've seen come to fruition. And it just obviously precedent is good because it determines how issues like this will be decided in the future. And because this one was a default judgment,

so to speak, it's still a question mark as to is free speech, does free speech protect misinformation? Does free speech protect conspiracy theories? But like I said, we're just not really sure here because the case was never actually heard and arguments were never made. So we'll see what happens as far as the damages being reduced, the bankruptcy proceedings, and the trials that still need to happen for the other families involved. But at the end of the day, for the sake of these families, I do hope they get some sort of closure from all of this, whether it be from facing him in court or money or whatever it may be. Okay, so on my last episode on the law, I covered the Brittany Griner case a little bit, and then just a few days after that episode went live, she received

her sentence of nine years. So let's do a brief recap really quick, a couple sentences. On February 17th, Griner was arrested in Russia after her luggage was found with vape cartridges containing hashish oil. She pled guilty shortly after her trial started but was just recently sentenced to nine years. She faced a maximum of 10 years and prosecutors asked for nine and a half so she got pretty close to that. Russia by the way has a 99% criminal conviction rate. They do not mess around over there. Like, if you have a criminal charge against you, chances are you will be convicted. So she made the decision to plead guilty, but ultimately they still had to determine her sentence, and that was nine years.

The judge said at the time she's already served, we'll go towards her sentencing time. But in my last episode if you listened to it um and if you haven't go ahead and do that we spoke a little bit about the potential swap that the united states was willing to do in order to get britney griner home the latest news though came one day after she was sentenced and that is that the u.s and russia have indicated that they are ready to hold talks over a prisoner swap. Russia's foreign minister told reporters in Cambodia that the Kremlin is ready to discuss. The potential swap as of now would give Russia Victor Bout, who is currently being held in a prison in the United States.

He's a notorious arms dealer. He holds the nickname the Merchant of Death. He would be given to Russia in exchange for Greiner and Paul Whelan, who is another U.S. citizen that has been held by Russia since 2018 on espionage charges. So here's the thing, and I want to ask you what you think. There's a prisoner in Russia right now. His name is Mark Fogel. Mark is a teacher from America. He was arrested last summer when he went to Russia because he had half of an ounce of medical marijuana in his luggage, which he was prescribed in the United States.

Now, medical marijuana is obviously illegal in Russia, but he's currently serving a 14-year sentence. What about him? His situation has gotten no attention, and only because of Greiner has he started to get some attention, but not nearly the attention that Greiner's case has gotten. Mark's wife, Jane, said in an interview with the Washington Post that she hopes her husband can be included in the swap but her hopes are fading. She said there's a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach that Mark will

be left behind. It's terrifying. I would hope that President Biden and especially First Lady Jill Biden, who is an educator, realize the importance of including Mark in the addition, in addition, to Brittany Griner and Paul Whelan. Mark himself recently wrote a letter home referencing the prisoner exchange reports and wrote, that hurt. Teachers are at least as important as basketball players. For those of you who don't know, by the way, Brittany Griner is a professional basketball player in Phoenix, Arizona. So I guess my question is, do you think Brittany Griner's status, and I spoke about this a little bit last episode, do you think Brittany Griner's status as a female professional basketball player played a role in all of this? Why aren't we paying attention to the man who was a teacher to many Americans? The man who had a prescription

for his marijuana. And I'm not here to say one case is more important than the other, but, you know, how do you determine who to swap? I'm sure it's a difficult decision. I know it's a difficult decision, of course. But I do encourage you guys to look into the past of all three individuals. Brittany Greiner, Paul Whelan, and Mark Vogel. And the kind of people they were and the kind of people they are. The kind of criminal backgrounds they have or, you know know just how they've lived their life and I've already done my own research on them so I know how I feel about this personally

but obviously I'm not here to give you guys my opinion I want you guys to form your own opinions based on the issue but by looking into these people. Like, what factors should we consider, you know, when deciding who to swap? We're giving them this notorious arms dealer who has been responsible for many, many American deaths and deaths around the world, and what are, what are we asking for in return, you know? So, yeah, I would encourage you to look into the American prisoners that are in Russia, the kind of people they are, and just think for yourself, like maybe you think all of them should come home because they're Americans and they belong on American soil, and that's fine, but I do want you to kind of give some thought as to what

factors do you think the president's administration should look into when deciding who to swap with another country, especially a country that we have so much tension with. So that's what I have to say about that. And then the next thing I want to talk to you guys about today is Netflix suing two TikTok creators. So this all started in January 2021. Just one month before that, in December 2020, Netflix released its original series, Bridgerton. Bridgerton quickly became one of its most popular series ever, won a ton of awards. People loved it, and I've heard that the second season is not nearly as good and it kind of went down the drain after that but less than a month after its initial release in January 2021 this singer slash artist slash tiktoker named Abigail Barlow started making these songs as if Bridgerton was a musical she made these these songs herself. They got a ton of attention.

Everyone loved them. Every video had at least a million views. And she realized people love this. Like, I'm going to keep going with it. I'm going to see where I can take this. So shortly after that, she brought on a writing partner. Her writing partner's name was Emily Bear, is Emily Bear. And together, the two girls created the unofficial Bridgerton musical and it blew up like when I tell you blew up I am not exaggerating they had interviews on news networks tv shows talk shows radio shows you name it um they ended up releasing their album with Spotify and they eventually ended up winning a Grammy. Okay, so then they started to do performances. So their first performance was a charity event in London.

Meanwhile, this whole time the girls reps had been in touch with Netflix, meaning like they were checking in with Netflix's legal team saying, hey, you know, this is going on. Do you guys approve of this? And by the way, all this information is from Netflix's complaint, like their lawsuit, which I will include, of course, on my website in the episode description. You can look through it yourself. All of the relevant facts are in there. Obviously, it's written towards Netflix's narrative, so we'll have to wait until the girls' attorneys answer that complaint to see, you know, what they have to say. But this is what Netflix is saying, that during all of this, the girls' reps had been in touch with Netflix and had been kind of letting them in on what was going on and the interviews the girls

were doing and this charity show that they had planned in London. And they had asked for Netflix's approval and authorization for these various things that the girls wanted to do. And Netflix was like, well, we can't give you our authorization or approval, but we're not going to stand in the way. That's such a lawyer response, by the way. And Netflix said that the girls could do the charity event in London, but they couldn't do any shows after that. The London show ended up getting delayed, but eventually it took place. And at some point, the girls got invited to perform at the Kennedy Center in DC at a for-profit show, meaning they would be making money from it. Whereas the other show was charity. When Netflix heard about it, they were like, look, we told you we didn't want

you doing any more shows, but if you want to do this, you need to get a license from us. The girls didn't get a license. They did the show anyway. It was a full-on show. Tickets were sold, merch was sold, VIP packages were sold. So naturally, three days after the show, Netflix filed suit alleging copyright infringement, infringement of registered trademarks, and false designation of origin. Most of us have heard of copyright infringement and infringement of registered trademarks, but for those of you who don't know, false designation of origin is when a person sells a product that causes some confusion as to the affiliation or connection between the person or entity selling the product and another person or entity not selling the product so in this case this comes from the girls selling their

live show and merch using bridgerton themed marketing material. And essentially what Netflix is saying is that by using this Bridgerton themed marketing material, other people like concert goers or fans or whoever were confused as to the affiliation or connection between these girls and the Bridgerton franchise or Netflix. Because of all of this, Netflix is asking the court for declaratory relief, which is essentially like asking the court to determine the rights of both parties, like what are we entitled to do, what are our rights, and preliminary and permanent injunctive relief, which means that the court issues an order stating the girls must stop promoting their Bridgerton musical as of now and for the rest

of time, damages, meaning money, and attorney's fees. So here's what's happening in my opinion. This all boils down to money. In the beginning, Netflix was supportive of the girls. Ultimately, the girls were bringing attention to the Bridgerton franchise and the girls weren't the ones profiting, right? Netflix was the one reaping all the benefits that these girls were sowing by performing Bridgerton and putting all these songs out there and bringing attention to the name. Then everything changed when the girls had this for-profit show at the Kennedy Center. Netflix now saw them as a threat to their own brand and their own live experience called the Queen's Ball. So if we're being fair, Netflix was pretty understanding. And this is all, again, according to Netflix's complaint.

So obviously Netflix is going to make themselves sound like the good guys. But they've been pretty understanding throughout the whole process. And we're trying to work with them, even offering them a license. They were transparent in saying that they didn't want, you know, they didn't support any of the live shows. And then when the girls wanted to do more live shows, Netflix said, OK, but you have to get a license, which seems fair, but the girls turned it down, went on their merry way, and did what they wanted. It's likely that this case will settle out of court, and even though there's pretty substantial evidence that the girls did infringe upon Netflix's intellectual property, the girls could come out of this with a

good deal still. It's obvious to me that Netflix sees them as an asset in some way this lawsuit doesn't necessarily mean that Netflix is wanting to take the girls for all that they're worth they just want this to end in their favor whether that be by the girls agreeing to get a license or really seeking damages or whatever so obviously there's a range of outcomes here. Like I said, the most likely outcome is that it settles out of court, but if it does make it to court, Harvard Law School English professor Derek Miller thinks this decision will likely come down to whether the unofficial Bridgerton musical is considered fair use. Fair use is an affirmative

defense to copyright infringement and essentially stands for the idea that yes, these people did infringe upon copyrights, but it was done for a limited and transformative purpose. A parody would be an example of this, which I don't think this situation classifies as a parody, but I'm giving you an example. So essentially the work, the original work is being transformed in some way. Fair use doesn't require the permission of the copyright owner and under the doctrine of fair use, something called fan fiction can be protected as long as the work is transformative and adds new meaning to the original work. But here's the catch.

Fan fiction must be non-commercial in nature and cannot result in profit for the creator of the work. So obviously the girls crossed the line once they performed at the Kennedy Center for profit. And just as an aside, in these commercial fair use instances, there's much more justification required. It's not as easy as it would be if the fan fiction was merely non-commercial. So that's a brief explanation of some of the different potential outcomes. This lawsuit is

brand new. It's just over a week old. There's plenty of time to see what happens. This case can easily settle relatively quickly. It can be drawn out for months, even years. It's hard to really tell. What do you think though? Do you think Netflix made the right move suing the girls? Do you think the girls should have originally agreed to the license to avoid all of this? Or do you think they were right in taking the risk that Netflix, as this huge company, would have never done anything about it and just would have let them go on their merry way? Also, as another note, in Netflix's complaint, they did say that the reps for the girls had

told Netflix on multiple occasions that the girls didn't want to be known as like the Bridgerton girls. They saw more for themselves. They didn't just want to do Bridgerton stuff. So I don't know if these girls are going to want a license or they're just going to let it go at this point and want to move on and do something else, you know? So anyway, as with everything, time will tell. But definitely remember to check out those resources on my website. You can look over this complaint yourself and see the facts, you know, according to Netflix. And thank you for being here for another episode diving into the current affairs and legal issues

before us. I hope you thoroughly enjoyed this episode. If you did, please, pretty please, with a cherry on top, maybe some hot fudge on there, leave me a five-star review. It supports my show more than you know. Don't forget to tune in every, every, every, every Monday for a new unbiased take on current events and the law. And don't forget to join me tomorrow, Tuesday, for an all-new episode of True Crime Tuesdays. Until then, stay open minded, stay educated, and stay happy. I'll talk to you guys soon.