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Ex-Wife Entitled to Payment from Script Settlement
Settlement proceeds from a writers' dispute involving the film Olympus Has Fallen must be further divided pursuant to one of the writer's divorce agreements, the Pennsylvania Superior Court has ruled. Bausch v. Green, 18-0463.
A unanimous three-judge panel of the court decided that screenwriter John Green, who co-wrote the 2013 thriller starring Gerard Butler, Aaron Eckhart, Morgan Freeman and others, needed to halve the $175,000 he received from a settlement agreement with his former writing partner, who had marketed and sold the script allegedly without Green's knowledge. The ruling affirmed a decision from the Delaware County Court of Common Pleas.
Green argued his former wife, Jessica Bausch, was not entitled to the money because their divorce agreement did not cover lawsuit proceeds that may be realized after the marriage. But the Superior Court panel, led by Judge Victor Stabile said the proceeds were essentially the result of a sale. “The trial court found that the script was sold for $175,000. The record, indeed [Green's] trial testimony, confirms those facts. Subsequent to that sale, [Green] relinquished any rights to the movie produced from the script,” Stabile said. “The [divorce agreement] does not specify which party had to sell the script, nor does the [divorce agreement] define proceeds.”
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