Jurors will decide how much Katy Perry’s 2013 mega-hit “Dark Horse” is worth and how much of that money should go to a Christian rapper whose song they already said the pop star copied.
Updated: A jury has found that Katy Perry, her collaborators and her record label must pay $2.78 million because the pop star’s 2013 hit “Dark Horse” copied a Christian rap song.
The jury awarded the money Thursday to Marcus Gray and his two co-writers on the 2009 song “Joyful Noise.”
Perry herself was hit for just over $550,000, with Capitol Records responsible for the vast majority of the money.
It was an underdog victory for Gray, a relatively obscure artist once known as Flame.
His 5-year-old lawsuit survived constant court challenges and a trial against top-flight attorneys for Perry and the five other music-industry heavyweights who wrote the song.
Jurors had already decided that “Dark Horse” copied “Joyful Noise” and then were tasked with finding how much the defendants owed.
Jurors will decide how much Katy Perry’s 2013 mega-hit “Dark Horse” is worth and how much of that money should go to a Christian rapper whose song they already said the pop star copied.
Attorneys for the two sides gave the jury wildly different figures to work with during closing arguments Thursday, the latest copyright infringement case against a major hit song.
Lawyers for rapper Marcus Gray and his two co-writers on the 2009 song “Joyful Noise” told the jury they should get nearly $20 million from the Perry song that grossed about $41 million. Defense attorneys argued for about $360,000.
“These defendants have made millions and millions of dollars from their infringement of the plaintiff’s copyright,” Gray’s attorney, Michael A. Kahn, told the jury. “They seek a fair portion of the defendants’ profits. Not all of them.”
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