An American photojournalist, Ms. Leuthold, was on the scene in
New York City on September 11, 2001. She licensed a number of still
photographs to the CBC for use in a documentary about the 9/11
attacks. The photos were included in 2 versions of the documentary,
and the documentary was aired a number of times between 2002 and
2004. We originally wrote about this in an earlier post: Copyright Infringement & Licensing
Pitfalls. The court found that the CBC had
infringed copyright in the photographs in six broadcasts which were
not covered by the licenses. Though Leuthold claimed damages of
over $20 million, only $20,000 was awarded as
damages by the court.
In Leuthold v. Canadian Broadcasting
Corporation, 2014 FCA 174, the Federal Court of
Appeal upheld an award of double costs against Leuthold. Early in
the litigation process, the CBC had formally offered to settle for
$37,500 plus costs. Ms. Leuthold did not accept the CBC's offer
and went to trial where she was
