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Second Circuit Sends <i>Ghost Rider</i> Copyright Back to District Court
A dismissed lawsuit over the rights to the Ghost Rider comic book character has been revived and sent back for trial. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit decided that Gary Friedrich, who claimed he created the flaming-skull motorcycle superhero, will get a chance to challenge Marvel Comics' claim that the character was the result of a collaborative process within Marvel. Gary Friedrich Enterprises LLC v. Marvel Characters Inc., 12-893.
The Second Circuit reversed the decision of Southern District Judge Katherine Forrest, who had granted summary judgment for Marvel and other defendants on Marvel's claim that it owned the renewal rights on the Ghost Rider character, which made its debut in 1972. District Judge Forrest found that Friedrich had assigned any rights to Ghost Rider when he executed a work-for-hire agreement in 1978, six years after the comic book first appeared. She dismissed Friedrich's claim and awarded $17,000 in damages to Marvel on its counterclaim for copyright infringement.
At the federal appeals circuit, Judges Ralph Winter, Denny Chin and Christopher Droney made the decision to send the dispute back to Judge Forrest by noting that the facts in the case were “heavily disputed.” Friedrich was a part-time freelance comic book writer when he presented to Marvel a written synopsis of the story of motorcycle stunt rider Johnny Blaze ' the Ghost Rider ' who sells his soul to the devil to save his adoptive father from cancer.
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