Jury rules Katy Perry and team infringed Christian rapper’s song

LOS ANGELES -- Pop star Katy Perry's song, "Dark Horse," infringed a 16-second portion of a song by a Christian rapper and his team, a federal jury ruled unanimously Monday.

After a weeklong trial, two days of deliberation and two questions, the nine jurors found Perry, the music studio representing her, and several producers and songwriters attached to her hit "Dark Horse" copied and distributed part of the music the Missouri-based rapper, known as FLAME, had released on YouTube. Marcus Gray v. Katy Perry, 15-CV05642 (C.D. Cal., filed July 1, 2014).

The defendants' work "contained material that was copied and distributed from" the musical composition of plaintiff Marcus Gray's song, "Joyful Noise." The jury also found the "concept and feel" of the two songs was substantially similar.

The jury also found the plaintiff's attorneys proved "Joyful Noise" was widely disseminated enough that it could reasonably have been heard by the creators of Perry's song, and the defense did not prove the creators of Perry's song couldn't have heard "Joyful Noise."

The jury found the defense did not prove "Dark Horse" was independently created by Perry and her producers and songwriters and found the plaintiffs had proved the beat of "Joyful Noise" was a joint work by plaintiff Gray and his team.

None of the defendants were exempt from the finding, the jury found. In addition to Perry they included Lukasz Sebastian Gottwald, who is a music producer known as Dr. Luke; Henry Russell Walter, a Canadian producer known as Cirkut; and Carl Martin Sandberg, known as Max Martin. All had testified in their defense saying they had never heard of "Joyful Noise" or the performer FLAME.

Other defendants found to have participated in the infringement are Jordan Houston, a rapper known as Juicy J; Sarah Theresa Hudson, Capitol Records LLC, Kasz Money Inc., Kobalt Music Publishing America Inc. and WB Music Corp.

As the jurors sent two questions to the court on Monday, attorneys on both sides began making preliminary plans for a damages trial that could begin as soon as Wednesday.

The second question seemed to seek guidance on the difference between copying and infringing.

"I assume these questions are asked because they've found 'Dark Horse' infringes 'Joyful Noise,'" said U.S. District Judge Christina A. Snyder a short time before the jury signaled it had a verdict.

After a debate among the attorneys the court seemed to come to the consensus that infringement constituted the offending party distributing and profiting from something it had copied.

The earlier question asked whether some parties earlier named in the lawsuit were still included, such as a limited liability company under Perry's name and a production company of rapper Juicy J. Both of those entities had been dropped from the case.

The plaintiffs' attorney, Michael Kahn of St. Louis-based law firm Capes, Sokol, Goodman & Sarachan PC, said during the debate over how to respond to the first question that it meant the jurors were looking for somebody to attribute a breach to. "They've found somebody infringed," Kahn said.

Defense attorney Christine Lepera, a partner at Mitchell Silberberg & Knupp LLP, in debating the response to the jury's question, said, "You must decide whether there was copying or distribution to each defendant."