Lost Fingers Lawsuit, for Adam Sandler's Happy Madison Productions

Richard Houpert seeks $1 million in damages after being injured building sets for the comedy "That's My Boy."

A Boston carpenter has sued Sony Pictures, subsidiary Columbia, and Sandler's Happy Madison Productions after suffering an injury building sets for That's My Boy in May 2011. Richard Houpert had several fingers partially cut off and sustained fractures on his right hand, and he seeks $1 million in damages.

In his complaint, filed last week at the District Court in Boston, Houpert claims he was working with a table saw when his hand was "drawn into the saw." The saw was not properly fitted with safety components such as saw stops and safety guards, he claims, and the injuries to his right dominant hand have caused him loss of income.

 “The cost to provide saws with saw stops, guards, or other safety equipment was minimal compared to the enormity of the risk of injury to the users of the saws,” the complaint argues.

Houpert has also targeted Sony and Columbia. The plaintiff claims the film production companies did not ensure safety on set despite having set aside a monetary fund for that purpose.

The studios are not the only ones Houpert blames—he has also taken aim at Black & Decker, the manufacturer of the saw. The Black & Decker 3-horsepower Delta unisaw was "dangerous and defective," "not of merchantable quality and unfit for its intended and forseeable uses," the complaint holds, and Houpert claims negligence and breach of implied and express warranties.

Read More.... http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/adam-sandlers-happy-madison-productions-580521

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Oscar Winning "Argo" faces lawsuit from Iran

The Iranian government is planning to sue Hollywood over Oscar-winning Argo, because they say the film is an "unrealistic portrayal" of their country, state media reported Tuesday.

Several Iranian news outlets, including the more liberal leaning Shargh Daily, said on Tuesday that French lawyer Isabelle Coutant-Peyre is in the country discussing with officials how they might go about filing the lawsuit.

Iran won’t be joining particularly auspicious company by becoming a Coutant-Peyre client: She is best known as the lawyer for infamous Venezuelan terrorist Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, aka Carlos the Jackal.

In January, sources reported that the Iranian government is now mounting its own film version of the events surrounding the rescue of American diplomats during the 1979 hostage crisis, which it plans to call The General Staff. The project is said to be getting a generous budget by Iranian standards from the Art Bureau of the Iranian government. Ataollah Salmanian, described as a minor figure in the Iranian industry, wrote the screenplay and is attached to direct.

Read More... http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/iran-planning-sue-hollywood-argo-427481

 

 

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Man convicted of selling $200,000 in fake Disney pins

A Southern California man was convicted Wednesday of illegally importing thousands of counterfeit Disney collectibles and selling them online, Orange County prosecutors said.

Larry James Allred, 58, pleaded guilty to a court offer of one felony count of trademark infringement, with an expected sentence of eight years in state prison and $201,000 in restitution, according to a statement from the Orange Country district attorney's office.

He faces sentencing enhancements because the property loss was more than $200,000 and because of previous convictions for rape in 1975 and for kidnapping and rape in 1978, prosecutors said. He will be sentenced in July.

Prosecutors said Allred, a Walnut resident, concocted a scheme with Robert Edward Smyrak from January 2010 to April 2011, in which they would send legitimate collectible Disney pins to a manufacturer in China to be replicated and shipped back to them.

The pair would then sell the counterfeit pins online, passing them off as legitimate.

Prosecutors said the men sold nearly 1 million counterfeit items on online auction sites in bulk quantities averaging less than $1 per pin. A legitimate pin would typically range from $6.95 to $14.95.

The operation was discovered in February 2011, when customs agents intercepted a parcel at Los Angeles International Airport addressed to Smyrak that had more than 150 pounds of the fake pins, prosecutors said.

Allred and Smyrak were arrested in April 2011 by Anaheim police, and had more than 90,000 pins in their possession at the time of the arrest, prosecutors said.

Smyrak, 54, pleaded guilty in September 2011 to one felony count of trademark infringement. He was sentenced to one year in jail, three years of formal probation and restitution.

Read More... http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2013/03/man-convicted-for-importing-selling-200000-in-fake-disney-collectibles.html