David Aronoff was featured in the Daily Journal article "Attorneys: "Monkey see, monkey sue" lawsuit is absurd." Full text can be found in the November 16, 2015, issue, but a synopsis is below.
A man named David Slater left his camera unattended at the Tangkoko Reserve, and came back to find that a monkey had taken a selfie with his device. Last year, Slater published a book in which he used photos that the monkey had taken on the website blurb.com.
Slater and blurb.com were sued by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) for allegedly infringing on the monkeys copyright as the author of the photos.
Fox Rothschild's David Aronoff said he has been around long enough that nothing completely surprises him, but this is a ridiculous lawsuit.
"There's no chance at all that any court is going to find that the monkey owns the copyright," Aronoff said. "The interesting question is whether a photograph taken by an animal can be copyrightable at all."
Aronoff wouldn't opine on the possibility of sanctions, but he did say defendants could be entitled to fees.
"Under Section 505 of the Copyright Act, the court is empowered to award attorney's fees to the prevailing party," Aronoff said. "I have a feeling that these probably wouldn't be awarded against the monkey himself, but maybe there's a chance of a fee award being entered against PETA."
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