Yamila Abraham, the publisher of Yaoi Press and a frequently quoted manga industry observer, has been indicted on seven counts of mail fraud, one count of misbranding a drug, one count of introducing goods into domestic commerce by means of false statement and criminal forfeiture for selling “Snurf.” The drug was billed as an “herbal alternative” to street drugs, but actually contained DXM, (dextromethorphan hydrobromide), a stimulant found in over-the-counter cough syrup. Arrested and indicted in Las Vegas, authorities say Abraham sold as many as 20,000 pills via mail order.

Abraham later posted to the Yaoi Press blog saying that while she was not allowed to talk about the ongoing investigation, she wanted to let readers know that Yaoi Press would continue in business:

Please keep a cool head, and have faith. This situation is not going to end Yaoi Press. Don’t believe the hype.

However, Yaoi Press survives on our convention income. A great portion of that income comes from those shows where I make personal guest appearances. You would think that if a show is willing to put the author of the Trach the Tentacle monster stories on their guest-list they aren’t too concerned with her reputation.

[snip] I will be at OtakuMex this weekend. Yes, I really will! You can also meet me at the Hollywood Book Fair on October 4th, then Anime St. George October 10th. I’m seriously looking forward to Yaoi Con October 30th.

There are no cancellations. I will be at these shows. I should have panels at them all. People may ask me about this situation. I probably won’t be able to answer them. I’m hoping for a fast resolution, but the sky started falling over 3 years ago, in 2006! If it’s taken this long to drop I’m not hopeful about this being over with fast.

We’d like to echo what Deb Aoki wrote:

A gentle reminder to readers: This indictment only means that charges were filed against Abraham, and it is not evidence of guilt. She’s innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. As she mentions in her statement, she will be continuing business as usual at Yaoi Press and will be honoring her convention appearance commitments. However, understandably, she will not be able to answer questions about these pending charges at her upcoming appearances.

ALL HELL IS BREAKING LOOSE. Last week, Jack Kirby’s four children filed notices of copyright termination for 45 characters . The LA Times has details. This is the same legal maneuver that the Siegel family employed to get back their half of the Superman copyright. Notices were sent to Marvel, Disney, Sony Pictures, 20th Century Fox, Paramount Pictures and Universal Pictures, suggesting that the 45 characters include many already being made into successful movie franchises.

Kirby, of course, co-created the Hulk, the X-Men, the Fantastic Four and hundreds more of Marvel’s 5000 characters. Copyright termination allows creators to apply for copyright reassignment after the term of the original contract runs out.
Under copyright law, creators and co-creators can seek to regain copyrights they previously assigned to a company 56 years after first publication and can give notice of their intentions to do so up to 10 years before that.

Kirby’s children would be eligible to claim their father’s share of the copyright of the Fantastic Four in 2017, while the Hulk would come up in 2018 and X-Men in 2019. The copyrights would then run for 39 more years before expiring, after which the characters would enter the public domain under current law.
The Kirby family is being represented by lawyer Marc Toberoff, who also handles the Siegel case. In Hollywood, he is known as a relentless litigator — he also represented the creator of The Dukes of Hazzard in a successful claim against Warner Bros.

Of course there’s a lot to be written and discussed about this. Jack Kirby spent many of his later years trying to get his ART back from Marvel, and he felt that he was not fairly compensated for his creations for years. It also casts a shadow over Disney’s recent acquisition of Marvel, although a Disney spokesperson said “The notices involved are an attempt to terminate rights seven to 10 years from now and involve claims that were fully considered in the acquisition.”

We’ll have a bit more on this later, but in the meantime, Marc-Oliver Frisch considers how appropriate it is that this news broke on what would have been the late Steve Gerber’s 62nd birthday. (Kirby and Gerber collaborated on DESTROYER DUCK.)

AND, Jeff Trexler reports on the latest in the Siegel/Superman case, including the potentially huge news that the presiding judge is retiring in a few months.

Artist Chris Weston is no stranger to mayhem, having drawn THE FILTH, THE TWELVE, and many more beloved comics classics. Doubtless the ninja training of working with Grant Morrison and JMS has honed his senses into the lightning fast reflexes he needed to actually solve a crime! After witnessing a robbery at his local bank, Weston raced home to sketch the dastardly perp. The rest:

I took my drawings round to the local cop-shop. Finding it full of your usual oiks and ne’er-do-wells, I was reluctant to broadcast my status as as a grass (yes I’m aware of the irony of that last statement given that I’m now announcing my deeds to the world on a blog)… so I gingerly approached the desk and whispered “I’d like to report a serious crime…”. The copper patiently asked for some more details, so I mouthed “The bank robbery …”. This got his attention and he asked me if I was a witness.

“I’m more than a witness!” I blurted, “Check these out!”

With the help of Weston’s artistic fidelity, the felon was nabbed and justice restored. All in a day’s work for…Comic Book Artist Man.

§ Ever vigilant Jeff Trexler reports on the latest ruling in the Superman case—the judge is pushing REALLY hard for a settlement.

As I’ve noted before, the judge in the ongoing Superman and Superboy lawsuits has been using his decisions to push the parties toward a settlement. The decision awarding addition material to the Siegels was no exception–Judge Larson may have pushed DC by giving the Siegels Krypton, but he also pulled back from a broader ruling that would have given the Siegels the copyright in Luthor and other key material.

Whatever the implications for copyright and comics history, Judge Larson’s opinions serve as paradigmatic example of judging as case management, as each new major ruling reminds the parties that the court is likely to issue a verdict that will satisfy neither side.

§ Over at Comics Comics Dash Shaw and Hope Larson talk about editing and why having a GOOD editor can be a very good thing:

I never got any feedback for Gray Horses. Oni Press was in an, um, transitional place at the time, and my book slipped through the cracks. I sent the script to a few friends, but they weren’t much help, either. That was when I realized that if I wanted a real editor, I’d better jump to a book publisher.

This probably makes it sound like the editorial relationship, for me, is all about my insecurities as a writer, but it isn’t. It’s about making the best books I can, and pushing my stories further. Some editors are able to look at a story and see what you’re trying to say when you can’t articulate it yourself. Some editors are more literary, while others are hyperaware of what the market wants. Some editors pursue structure, structure, structure above all else.

We were not aware that Denver, CO was a hotbed of both methamphetamines and comics speculation, but the two went hand in hand in a huge meth lab that sold pound and pounds of the stuff. 41 people were indicted in what is being called a “massive” and sophisticated operation. Brothers Aaron and Alfonzo Castro were believed to be the ringleaders and they used a comics collection valued at $500,000 to launder their money.

Among the 100 boxes of comics were collectors’ items, including first-edition Batman and Superman comics stored in protective plastic wrapping. Some of the comics were worth thousands of dollars.

“What we are talking about is money laundering — a means to have something of value that can easily be converted to cash but keeps you from having stashes of cash around,” Suthers said.

But given the volatility in the collectible market, one wonders if this was really a wise way to store assets. Too much investment in, say, Deathmate or recent Captain America issues and the whole drug empire could have come tumbling down.

The latest round of the seesaw “one for you, one for me” legal battle between the heirs of Superman co-creator Jerry Siegel and Time Warner has gone to the Siegels, according to ICv2:

The heirs of Jerry Siegel have won another round in the court case over the rights to Superman because of a blog comment on Newsarama by long-time publisher and agent Denis Kitchen. The ruling in federal court determined that the Seigel heirs own the rights to Action Comics #4; Superman #1, pages 3-6; and the first two weeks worth of Superman daily newspaper strips. The court had earlier held that the Siegel heirs owned the rights to ACTION #1 (see “Siegel Heirs Win Superman Case”).

While we expect Jeff Trexler to come along any minute and explain this in depth, the ruling stems from a post by Trexler (not, as far as we can tell, Denis Kitchen) revealing early versions of of Superman — predating their contract with Detective Comics — by Siegel and artist Russell Keaton. The material has been deemed to be owned by the Siegels due to their previous recapture of Action #1.

Likewise, we haven’t had time to delve into all the various levels of the return of Marvelman, but let’s just say all the players are tuning up for a whang dang doodle of a hootenanny. Rich Johnstongathers up some early reports and message board postings, including Erik Larsen’s declaration that “Neil Gaiman is a dick.” Oh yeah, it’s on. For a more researched take, here are Steve Bissette’s findings.

Former Radical Comics EIC Dave Elliott is suing the comics publisher/movie company, claiming a litany of breaches:

David Elliott has filed a lawsuit against Blatant (which also owns the film arm Radical Pictures) and shareholders Barry Levine, Jesse Berger and Matthew Berger in California Superior Court. Elliott says he’s the co-founder, co-publisher, and former editor-in-chief of the company and its various publishing efforts, and that it terminated him in April. Elliott alleges that Blatant hasn’t given him his full salary, failed to properly credit him on several projects including Hercules and Aladdin, and is exploiting properties without consideration where Elliott owns a portion of the copyrights.

THR has a copy of the complaint, and the most interesting thing is this:

“Blatant’s management failed to have any of its employees sign work-for-hire agreements and/or assignments of copyrights, thereby clouding title to all of Blatant’s projects, and making it impossible for Blatant to provide proper chain of title documents and guarantees to investors, production companies, studios, and insurers, to the detriment of its shareholders.”

If true, this would come as quite a shock to the many players around town who have signed various sorts of deals with Radical. Talk about a ready made topic for cocktail party chatter!

Speaking of Radical, they have a huge booth on the floor and are the latest company to sport oversized giveaway bags.

The NY Post has deets:
Apparently Superman was the scofflaw; Batman just got caught in a costumed vigilante sweep.

We’re going to have to leave explaining this one to the lawyers. Short version — while the decision did rule in WB/DC’s favor, it did leave the matter of a Superman film up in the air, as further delays in making a Superman movie could be seen as actionable.

Brian Cronin at CBR:

A major point that you have to understand is that it is not the Court’s responsibility to determine if DC Comics got the best deal possible, but only that the deal was reasonable. In fact, Larson basically seemed to come down on the side of thinking that the licensing fee DC was paid for Superman Returns was on the low side of things, but he did not feel that it was unreasonably low. Larson specifically denied the Siegels’ claim that Superman should be treated like a major novel or a musical, as Larson agreed with the defendants that in the case of comic book licensing, the film company is licensing the characters, not the story (as noted by the many years that Warner Bros. Entertainment spent trying to come up with a workable script for a Superman film). When a film company licenses a novel, however, they’re basically getting a rough screenplay right from the beginning, and as such, popular novels and musicals are much more valuable. So even if Larson felt that the licensing fee was a bit on the low side, it was still a reasonable fee.

Jeff Trexler, who has been following Superman related legal cases for a long time, has a brief analysis here, and a longer piece here including the news that a special master has been assigned to the case:

The judge presiding over the Siegel Superman trials has set December 1, 2009 as the start date for the apportionment phase, with a pre-trial hearing scheduled for November 9. But that doesn’t mean the case will be dormant until then. Citing the difficulties evident in determining the fair market value of the Superman properties, the judge has provided for the appointment of a special master/court-appointed expert to issue a report before the trial. The parties have until July 31 to make a joint stipulation as to who this master/expert should be. As the court indicates, the appointment of a special master is appropriate in cases that involve accounting issues and other complex matters that could be difficult for a judge to resolve effectively.

Today, a decision was handed down in one of the lawsuits involving Superman and the Siegel family. The Siegel family — including Joanne Siegel and Laura Sigel Larson — were granted half the copyright to Superman in 1999, and the present case involved their share of the revenue from such Superman appearances as Smallville. The Siegels argued that a “sweetheart deal” from Warner Bros. led to lower than market value licensing fees for the use of Superman.

However, the court did not see it that way, and ruled that the fees were within market value.

DC released a statement, reading:

DC Comics and Warner Bros. Entertainment are very gratified by the court’s thorough and well-reasoned decision in this matter. The decision validates what DC and Warner Bros. have maintained from the beginning, which is that when they do business with each other, they always strive for – and achieve – fair market value in their transactions. We are very pleased that the court found there was no merit to plaintiffs’ position that the Superman deals were unfair to DC Comics and, by extension, the plaintiffs.

The decision can be read here.

CBR has some commentary. Jeff Trexler, who is closely following the case, has brief comments here and here. We’ll have some more commentary after we read the decision.

Any story that includes the terms “Mexican midget wrestler” and “hooker” (or “sexoservidoras” as they are called in Mexico) might seem ripe for comedy, but the murder of two pint- sized luchadores is no laughing matter. As reported in the NY Post and elsewhere, Alberto and Alejandro Jimenez, aka La Parkita and El Espectrito Jr., twin brothers who wrestled together in various Lucha and US indies, were found dead in a Medico City hotel room, apparently after being poisoned by two women they hired to come back to their hotel.

The 35-year-old little wrestlers, or luchadores, were first approached by the deadly call girls in the hotel lobby, where the brothers went after filming a match at a nearby ring for television.

The twins were apparently slipped the poison though an eye-dropper into their alcoholic drinks.

A rash of similar black widow-style attacks on men in bars by ladies of the evening has broken out in Mexico.

About 20 women, connected to a gang called “The Leak” or “The Drops,” have been busted in Mexico in the past year for the booze-drug scam.

It’s believed that the dosage that would merely knock out a normal sized man was fatal to the twins.

There’s more on the murders on this Spanish-manguage website, including a police sketch of two suspects that is so disturbing we’re putting it in the jump!

Meanwhile, La Parkita and El Espectrito Jr — “LIttle Death” and Little Ghost” — were popular enough that folks dressed up in their masks at a memorial service, leading to a series of surreal photos. (There’s an even more surreal one here, but it’s too sad to run.)

While the obviously lurid aspects of the story have created much of the interest, it has also raised even more of an outcry in the Mexican press for a crack down on these thieving gangs. For if a midget wrestler is not safe…who is?

(more…)

UPDATE: Here’s the news story confirmation:

A COMIC book artist has been cleared of raping and sexually abusing a 13-year-old girl. Ronald Smith, of Grange Close in Godalming, had been accused of attacking the youngster, who is now 39, for three years during the 1980s. Mr Smith maintained his innocence throughout a five-day trial at Guildford Crown Court, telling the jury he had never touched the woman “at any time or in any way” and suggesting she had fabricated the allegations out of spite. The former RAF serviceman - who drew Judge Dredd and 2000 AD - was cleared by a jury on Friday of five counts of rape, two counts of buggery and two of indecent assault.

[Thanks, Steven Stahl, for the swift link.]

Numerous reports via UK twittering that artist Ron Smith has been found not guilty of all charges.

The 80-year-old JUDGE DREDD and 2000 AD artist who was under trial this week regarding charges of sexual abuse against a teen-aged girl alleged to have occurred in the ’80s. The accuser, now 39, only came to the police recently, but Smith protested his innocence:

“It is just so ridiculous,” the former Air Force soldier said. He suggested the woman could be lying because she was bitter with him over past events.

“I never touched her in any way or at any point,” Smith added.

“I certainly never had sex with her and I did not rape her. I did not even go near her, it just did not happen.”

Smith, who told police he was being treated for skin cancer, also said he was never alone with the girl between 1983 and 1986, when the abuse was said to have happened.

“It might sound incredible but it is absolutely true,” he added. “There is not a shred of truth to these allegations, they are false through and through.”

Although we don’t have a link to a news story on the trail result, so we’ll update this when more becomes available.

The British SUN tabloid is to sober news reporting what a caramel frappucino is to healthy food, but here’s a sad story from its pages: JUDGE DREDD artist Ron Smith is on trial for abusing a 13-year-old girl back in the ’80s.

Smith, 80 - who drew the futuristic cop cartoon for 2000AD magazine - was said to have assaulted the girl over three years in the 1980s.

Smith acted out a string of sick fantasies in the guise of “teaching” her - even role-playing a knifepoint rape, Guildford Crown Court heard.

The woman, now 39, went to police last year.

Smith, of Godalming, Surrey, denies rape and indecent assault.

The Baltimore City Paper has news of another debt against Diamond owner Steve Geppi,, this time a $600K loan from Camden National Bank in Maine, used for a controversial land purchase in Maine. This debt is related to a previously reported $16 million debt to PNC bank, which, according to a story in the Bangor Daily News, is the unpaid mortgage on the Maine property purchased by Geppi and partner Walter Skayhan. Property use included converting a closed mill into luxury condos (above):

The action is a response to an emergency motion filed March 19 by an attorney for PNC Bank of Pittsburgh, Pa. That bank holds a large mortgage — including $14.7 million in unpaid principal — on the properties. According to the bank, Maine Investment Properties and the limited liability companies are in default of the mortgage.

In 2005, Maine Investment Properties purchased from credit card lender MBNA several properties in Rockland, Camden, Belfast and Northport that were assessed at $50 million.

Company partners Walter Skayhan and Steve Geppi converted part of the sprawling former textile mill in Camden into 30 luxury condos. The company also donated one property, the Camden Area Christian Food Pantry on Mount Battie Street, to that charitable organization in 2007.

Two and a half years ago, firm vice president Brett Cohen called the Knox Mill complex “a true success story” in an interview with the Bangor Daily News.

As our previous story reported, Geppi has several other outstanding personal debts which are unrelated to Diamond, and other local investments, including his Entertainment Museum and the Baltimore Orioles, continue to struggle in the ongoing tough economy.

First link via Kevin Melrose.

§ Wired interviews Christopher Handley’s lawyer, Eric Chase, who explains what he was up against.

Chase says he recommended the plea agreement to his client because he didn’t think he could convince a jury to acquit him once they’d seen the images in question. The lawyer declined to describe the details. “If they can imagine it, they drew it,” he says. “Use your imagination. It was there.”

The case began in 2006, when customs officials intercepted and opened a package from Japan addressed to Handley. Seven books of manga inside contained cartoon drawings of minors engaged in sexually explicit acts. One book included depictions of bestiality, according to stipulations in Handley’s plea deal.

(Note: This confirms that it was Customs, not the Post Office, which opened the package,)

§ Manga expert Matt Thorn clarifies some of the language from his previous posts. There is no “literal gag order.” Also, Thorn, who lives in Japan, is attempting to find out what are the actual manga involved in the case, as that really seems to be the crux of the matter. Some descriptions of the material make it sound like out-and-out hentai type porn; others sound like yaoi/lolicon, where the characters may appear younger than they are.

And two from:

§ Brigid Alverson. FINDER, a gangster manga by Ayano Yamane, has been “indexed” in Germany, where it’s published by Tokyopop’s German arm. This means it’s been deemed “harmful to minors,” but apparently that has something to do with minors being able to buy it, unchecked. In the US, FINDER was published by BeBeautiful.

§ AND, Yamila Abraham on Yaoi Press reports that her printer refused to print a yaoi-themed coloring book calling the images “disturbing.”

“Because of the nudity of this file we are unable to print this for you. The order before this one should not have been printed but did slide by without us looking through the entire book.”

It doesn’t pay for us to throw tantrums over things like this. However, I feel they’ve made a mistake. The coloring book is 16+. There are side views of nude characters, but naughty bits are not visible. There are no sex scenes, but some images are suggestive that sex is coming. It didn’t even cross my mind that a printer might not agree to print it. I called and told them that the characters are all male. I think they might think the characters are female and we’re showing bare breasts.

The images can be seen in the link, so judge for yourself.

Yesterday, manga expert Matt Thorn had a long post on his blog reprinting a series of correspondence he’d had with Christopher Handley’s lawyer and mother. Thorn was asked to be an expert witness, but it never got beyond the talking stage. Handley’s mother posted some comments that make this entire case even more disturbing, accusing her son’s lawyers of not properly explaining what he was pleading guilty to, and in general painting her son as a harmless, hapless victim of a series of events. (OF course, she IS his mom…) She also mentioned that Handley is a diabetic who “isn’t made for prison life”…and one assumes the kind of prison life someone convicted of ordering child porn gets is a little worse than other kinds of prison life.

The correspondence has been removed today, because of a gag order on the case, Thorn reports. There were plenty of excerpts around the web, however, including ICv2.

BTW, file this under speculation, but many people are wondering why Handley’s mail was opened by the Post Office, and why it was flagged. We’re not entirely clear on this, but if the package came from Japan, it would have to go through Customs. and it’s normal for packages to be randomly (or not so randomly) flagged and inspected by Customs, so this could be why it was opened.

A lot of talk everywhere about Christopher Handley’s guilty plea for owning obscene material. As always, go to Brigid for the complete rundown, but a few call-outs.

§ Lawyer Jeff Trexler points out some very important facts, including the fact that because the case did not go to trial, it did not set a precedent. But he’s also frank about the realities:

Local counsel versus the CBLDF. The decision of local counsel to work for a plea bargain was not irrational. In fact, it reflects a sober assessment of the law and the underlying facts. The chance of success on the constitutional claim was slim, perhaps non-existent. Moreover, the manga images in question did not appear to be the sort of thing that an Iowa jury would find to have socially redeeming value. No matter how many manga experts or First Amendment scholars you bring into court, your average midwestern juror is not going to declare “graphic bestiality, including sexual intercourse, between human beings and animals such as pigs, monkeys, and others” to be a reflection of community standards.

Over at Japanator, someone claiming to be a friend of the Handley family is posting,

The list went on and on. The thing of it is, the four comics that started this whole mess, he didn’t even see what pictures were inside of it. At one point, they even tried to claim that he was a child molester (never at ANY time has Chris been inappropriate with a child. NEVER) They stated that they could prove that he had a thing for kids. They never found ANYTHING other than comics and drawings of anime. PERIOD. They claimed that since the females in the drawings had no pubic hair, then they must be minor children. Which is ridiculous. They tried to claim that he was a threat to society. He’s not a threat to anybody. He had told his sister that he was taking the plea for obscene materials, because that he was guilty of. But he was NOT guilty of obscene materials containing children. The “containing children” part was not told to him by his lawyer. I think Chris got screwed three ways to Sunday on this.

But you should take all that with a grain of salt.

After talking to a few people in the know about this case, it is important to stress in all of this is that Handley does not have a history of being any kind of sexual predator; he does not collect erotica, pornography or anything like it. He is a manga collector. As the poster above, whoever it is, points out, he is not a threat to anyone anywhere. He could be any one of us. Hopefully this plea bargain will get him less than 15 years in jail, because that would be a travesty of justice of sickening proportions.

The takeaway? It’s always a good time to support the CBLDF.

As reported yesterday, Christopher Handley, the Iowa man arrested for owning drawn material depicting children engaged in sexual acts, has pleaded guilty to possessing obscene visual representations of the sexual abuse of children and mailing obscene material. Handley was arrested after Customs intercepted a package from Japan containing the questionable material specifically “Japanese manga drawings of minor females being sexually abused by adult males and animals.”

Pursuant to his plea agreement, Handley today pleaded guilty to one count of possessing obscene visual representations of the sexual abuse of children in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 1466A(b)(1), which prohibits the possession of any type of visual depiction, including a drawing, cartoon, sculpture, or painting, that depicts a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct that is obscene.

Handley also agreed to plead guilty to one count of mailing obscene material and to forfeit all seized property. Handley faces a maximum of 15 years in prison, a maximum fine of $250,000, and a three-year term of supervised release.

The CBLDF had supported Handley as a special consultant, and has released a statement, reproduced below.

Although no one likes a kiddie fiddler, that is not the issue here — Handley did not have a record as a sex offender. As Dirk Deppey observes (albeit with a very disturbing, NSFW panel from LOST GIRLS), anyone owning a copy of LOST GIRLS might be guilty of the same crime Handley committed. In fact, we just got a package from a manga publisher and have no idea what is in it — is it something we could go to jail for? Current US law prosecutes drawings of child pornography the same as photographed material, and that is troubling on many levels.

Don’t get us wrong, we find the loli-con, child sex branch of manga and anime very disturbing and troubling. (Hell, we find Ray Caesar’s work disturbing and troubling.) But it isn’t the same thing as actual child pornography.

Brigid has more. ANN has a long forum discussion. Here’s Neil Gaiman on why the case matters. Lawrence A. Stanley has more on the legal difference between obscenity and child pornography.

Here’s the CBLDF release:

According to a press release issued by the Department of Justice, the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund has learned that Christopher Handley, the Iowa manga collector, has pleaded guilty “to possessing obscene visual representations of the sexual abuse of children and mailing obscene material.” CBLDF had served as a special consultant to Mr. Handley’s defense. The government’s press release states, “Handley faces a maximum of 15 years in prison, a maximum fine of $250,000, and a three-year term of supervised release.” Additionally, he forfeits all property seized in his prosecution.

The CBLDF became special consultant to Mr. Handley’s defense team last October. In this limited role, the Fund facilitated access to First Amendment experts; recommended expert witnesses on manga; and funded expert research pursuant to an eventual jury trial. The CBLDF spent $2,400 on that research, and had allocated up to $15,000 for expert witness expenses.

“Naturally, we are very disappointed by this result, but understand that in a criminal case, every defendant must make the decision that they believe serves their best interest,” CBLDF Executive Director Charles Brownstein said. “Because the set of facts specific to this case were so unique, we hope that its importance as precedent will be minimal. However, we must also continue to be prepared for the possibility that other cases could arise in the future as a result.”

Brownstein adds, “Mr. Handley now faces the loss of his freedom and his property, all for owning a handful of comic books. It’s chilling. The Fund remains unwavering in our commitment to be prepared to manage future threats of this nature wherever they arise. This is the unfortunate conclusion of Mr. Handley’s case, but it is not the end of this sort of prosecution. For that reason, the Fund stands steadfast in our commitment to defending the First Amendment rights of the comics art form.”

Last week, Roger Friedman, a showbiz columnist who worked for Fox, wrote a column in which he reviewed the download bootleg version of WOLVERINE. This weekend, unsurprisingly, he was fired (although he is saying he wasn’t). The entire affair de Wolvie has led to mucho confusion among movie websites, most of whom have to play serious pattycake with the studios even when a lot of them got their start by releasing information they shouldn’t have had. Oh, the humanity.

BTW, we’ve already removed a few comments here that reviewed the download and will continue to do so. Obviously, the genie is out of the bottle but out of respect for the craftspeople who worked on the film, that’s our policy and we’re sticking to it. Now would we link to reviews by people who saw screenings of the finished movie and raced home to their computers to write about it? Sure…we’ve done it ourselves! But that’s part of the game. There are plenty of places on the internet to get things spoiled for you…The Beat generally isn’t one of them.

However, we will continue to cover the Wolverine movie in great depth and detail because it enables us to post many more pictures of NAKED WOLVERINE.

Rest easy, readers. While we’re going back to our regularly scheduled features right now, we’ll be breaking in with coverage of broody, smokin’ hot Wolverine, as events warrant.

We will also break in with pictures of other cast members of X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE whenever there is emerging news.

Related: Vulture rounds up a list of suspects.

Glen Hauman interviews the scans_daily moderators over at ComicMix, and it’s interesting on many levels.

ComicMix: What do you know about the circumstances of the shutdown? Has LiveJournal told you what prompted the shutdown? Were you given any warning, or any ability to address the situation?

Stubbleupdate: I crawled out of bed on Saturday morning (which meant that the community would have been deleted late evening/night on Friday, America time) and saw that my inbox had a lot of LJ friends requests from people on the community. I get that sometimes, but four overnight is unusual. They all wanted to know where the community had gone, which is the first that I had heard of it. A lot can happen in six hours on the internet.

We’ll drink to that. Later on, there’s this:

Rabican: We don’t have any hard data about this, but honestly, as moderators of an 8000+ member community … we didn’t really have the time. Still, the distinction needs to be made between 8000 people on an online community and 8000 people scattered throughout the comics-buying audience. Yes, many of us on s_d did share the same tastes (ironically, there was a strong Peter David fan contingent), but I would be surprised if any title besides the most popular, best-selling comics broke more than 1,000 buyers from our membership. (That’s just a ballpark guess, since we’ve never taken polls and have a lot of lurkers anyway.) Eight thousand people is a large number, but 1,100 buyers of New Avengers here, 600 people with Invincible on their pull lists there … that’s just going to vanish in larger market fluctuations.

We hadn’t realized that the scans_daily community was larger than the paid circulation of all but a handful of periodical comics not published by Marvel and DC (and more than quite a few comics published by Marvel and DC). To all those people who said that exposure on scans_daily meant greater sales, wouldn’t it make sense for periodical comics sales (other than stunt event comics) to be RISING rather than falling? Yes, we know that free sampling works, but we must have taken stupid pills today because we just don’t get it.

A few people have linked to this post at Mightygodking as being of interest, but we couldn’t tell you exactly why.

Over the weekend, news broke that the popular LiveJournal community Scans–Daily has been closed down. The community started out as a repository for slash fiction, but has developed into a wide-ranging sampler of all kind of copyrighted comics material — some of it long unavailable, some fresh and new. Although moderators worked to prevent posting complete stories there, those opposed to “pirate posting” sites had a lot to dislike about Scans-Daily.

Brigid Alverson has the most thorough and level-headed round-up of links and so on, including the new home of the site. (Nothing goes away for too long on the Internet.) But there is much more. Writer Peter David had recently found out about the site and was suspected of having “ratted them out”; however, in a message thread that’s up to 500 posts and counting at his blog, he explained he was not responsible. (LJ had shut down the site after Photobucket reported TOS violations.)

We’re not going to get too much into all of this — we posted a few links to S_D here, always to things that were otherwise unavailable, and got shit for it. If you want to wade into the 500+ post thread, go right ahead. The most extreme ends of either side are “stealing is always bad” vs “free sampling is always good” with every shade of gray in-between. Kevin Melrose has more thoughts — as does just about everyone on the internet — while Lisa Fortuner examines the facet that Scans-Daily grew out of female fan interests and what that had to do with its end:

That said, I do think that if Scans_Daily were a male dominated community it would have not been suspended like this. Why? Because I don’t think it would have been on a site like Livejournal. In my experience, that’s where the male-female distinction seems to be. Female fans populate social network sites run by panicky male-dominated corporations who want to make money from selling advertising to women, but don’t really have the brass ovaries to deal with hosting female interaction on the internet. It’s like they expect feathered sugar with a hint of spice and are shocked to discover girls have locker room talk and smoke in the bathroom. Male fan communities seem to be owned and operated by like-minded males, the male-dominated comic company itself, the comic creator who gathers his own fans to his side, or the self-style Pirate King who set up the torrent site specifically for illegal activities and searched around for an ISP that wouldn’t check on him too closely.

Tom Spurgeon makes what seems to be a sensible point:

Creators should have the right to control their works even if the person who wants to usurp that right means no real harm, thinks they know better, actually knows better, supported that creator in the past, or whatever. If you want to support a creator, embrace with seriousness the actions they’ve taken or declined to take when it comes to on-line iterations of their work.

In other words, “Free sampling is for your own good!” isn’t a particularly grown-up response, although it is certainly one that is common in the Internet Era.

More soon, in all probability.

Editorial cartoonist Brian Duffy was recently let go from his job at the Des Moines Register; after leaving, he discovered that his artwork, which had been left behind, was not going to be returned to him but was planned to be donated to the University of Iowa.

Duffy said he was always under the impression that his sketches were a joint copyright, just like when he published his book.

“Copyright Brian Duffy and the Des Moines Register, not just the Des Moines Register,” said Duffy. “I have no problem donating a large body of work to the University of Iowa. In fact, I’d love to do that.”

But he wants to do it on his terms not on behalf of the newspaper that shooed him out the door.

Now Ted Rall, president of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists, has written an open letter to Carolyn Washburn, the editor of the paper:

Dear Ms. Washburn:

As President of The Association of American Editorial Cartoonists (AAEC), I am writing to express the collective dismay of our membership at reports that you plan to dispose of Brian Duffy’s original political cartoons without his consent.

While your newspaper may claim ownership of Brian’s thousands of original cartoons he drew during 25 years as The Register’s staff editorial cartoonist, there remain compelling questions of what is customary and what is right.

Although it used to be common for newspapers to keep their cartoonists’ original artwork, that practice changed decades ago, and almost universally cartoonists now leave their newspapers with their artwork. These original drawings represent an artist’s life work, and while newspapers pay for the its production, they do so in order to publish the work on its editorial page—not to possess each piece as artwork.

(more…)

In recent weeks, while news of Diamond’s new trade policies has rippled through every level of the comics business, Diamond’s owner, Stephen Geppi, has also been hit with several lawsuits for outstanding debts. While Geppi’s various business interests, including the Geppi Entertainment Museum and Gemstone Publishing , are all separate corporations, the overall picture of debt that emerges is an uncomfortable one for the comics industry.

In one link being widely circulated this morning, court documents reveal that California debt collection agency Creditors Trade Association is suing Gemstone, Diamond, and Geppi for $373,000.00 on behalf of Global Interprint, the print broker for many of Gemstone’s deluxe editions. According to court documents, Gemstone owes the money for the printing bills on such books as Hopalong Cassidy, EC Archives, Frontline Combat, and Haunt of Fear. The bills were run up between December 2007 and September 2008, with none of the monies being paid.

According to another link posted by Rich Johnston on Monday, a “confessed judgment” has been ruled against Geppi in a case involving a $16,466,205.32 debt to P N C Bank. According to one legal expert we checked with, a confessed judgment involves a situation where a debtor signed a written document providing that if specified payment was not made, a judgment could be entered against him for the remaining amount. Although the case is listed as closed, Geppi will have a chance to make further legal motions in a hearing set for March 26th. Unfortunately, the court documents in the case are not online, so no further information on the nature of the debt is readily available. Neither Diamond nor Gemstone is named in this case, at least according to the documents online.

Adding to Geppi’s woes, his entertainment museum has been losing money and has run up a sizable unpaid rent bill as of September:

Geppi’s Entertainment Museum, founded in September 2006 by Diamond Comic Distributors CEO Steve Geppi, is more than $700,000 in debt. Maryland’s Daily Record reports the Baltimore pop-culture museum has accrued about $622,500 in unpaid rent to the Maryland Stadium Authority, and owes more than $77,000 in late fees and unpaid electric bills dating back to February 2007.

According to a report on ICv2, a rent settlement had been negotiated for payment by last December.

In looking at the big picture, the debts mentioned above are all separate from Diamond’s distribution business (although Diamond is named in the Global Interprint suit), but obviously if Steve Geppi can’t pay his bills, something has to give. It certainly puts all of Diamond’s recent cost cutting measures — new trade terms, layoffs and so on — into a new light.

Evan Dorkin rounds up the potential dangers of too-literal readings of recent laws aimed at testing lead levels in children’s toys:

Anyway — said impact will be nothing short of devastating for many small businesses, home-crafters, DIY-ers, toy manufacturers, clothing manufacturers, re-sellers, used clothing shops, thrift shops, and so on and so forth. And also, libraries, book stores and yeah, comic shops. Because a ton of stuff is being lumped together under this act, which will require expensive product testing for anything deemed “for children”. Children’s clothes, books, comics, school supplies, toys, costumes, need I go on? And second-hand items, clothes, toys, books, back issues, etc. It doesn’t end once you start thinking about it. And, in fact, it gets worse, because it affects inventory. So, dump your inventory, Target, Toys R Us, etc, and smaller businesses, you lose those toys and shirts that will possibly bankrupt you. No more crafting on Etsy, et al. You can’t even, under this law, knit blankets for Project Linus , which provides blankets for children in need. So why the F didn’t the people who slapped this together think about it?

A follow-up post takes on debunkers of the alarm bells:

As Sarah says — unfortunately, people are going to believe whom they want to believe, but I actually read through the relevant sections myself and Snopes is wrong. It’s not murky. Enforcement will probably be murky, but the law is not. I think they’re wrong, too. We’ve seen a lot of people slamming the Snopes article, but apparently the people at the site have made up their minds and are sticking to their guns. So, who debunks the debunkers? I dunno. Life is sticky.