Los Angeles News Service v. Reuters Television International., Ltd.
United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
149 F.3d 987 (1998), cert. denied, 525 U.S. 1141 (1999)

- Written by Sarah Holley, JD
Facts
Los Angeles News Service (plaintiff) (LANS) was an independent news organization that produced and licensed news stories, photographs, and other services to the news media for a profit. During the Los Angeles riots of 1992, LANS captured footage of an infamous event and licensed the resulting works—The Beating of Reginald Denny and Beating of a Man in White Panel Truck—to National Broadcasting Co. (NBC) for broadcast on the Today show. Pursuant to a prior arrangement, NBC transmitted the broadcast featuring the LANS footage to Visnews International (USA), Ltd. in New York. Visnews then copied the broadcast and transmitted it to subscribers in Europe and Africa, as well as to the New York office of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU). The EBU copied the broadcast and transmitted it to Reuters Television International, Ltd. (defendant) in London, and Reuters in turn transmitted copies of the broadcast to its subscribers. LANS brought suit against Visnews and Reuters for copyright infringement. The district court, among other rulings, granted summary judgment in favor of Visnews and Reuters with respect to extraterritorial infringement and damages resulting therefrom, finding that Visnews and Reuters could not be held liable for acts of infringement that occurred outside the United States. LANS appealed.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Schwarzer, J.)
What to do next…
Here's why 816,000 law students have relied on our case briefs:
- Written by law professors and practitioners, not other law students. 46,300 briefs, keyed to 988 casebooks. Top-notch customer support.
- The right amount of information, includes the facts, issues, rule of law, holding and reasoning, and any concurrences and dissents.
- Access in your classes, works on your mobile and tablet. Massive library of related video lessons and high quality multiple-choice questions.
- Easy to use, uniform format for every case brief. Written in plain English, not in legalese. Our briefs summarize and simplify; they don’t just repeat the court’s language.