CBLDF: US CUSTOMS BLINKS

[MattBrady]

The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund has reported that it has won a victory against US Customs in the case concerning the seizure of parody comics in Charleston, South Carolina.

As Newsarama readers will recall, the books, copies of the Stripburger anthology were seized by Customs in November after the agency claimed that two of the stories contained therein: “Richie Bush” by Peter Kuper, and “Moj Stub” (“My Pole”) by Bojan Redzic were of piratical nature, and infringed the copyrights of the respective owners.

From the CBLDF’s original release about the seizure: "Richie Bush," appearing in Stripburger (Vol. 12) #37, is a four-page parody of Richie Rich that also satirizes the Bush Administration by superimposing the personalities of the President's cabinet on the characters from the comic. "My Pole," appearing in Stripburger (Vol.3) # 4-5, which was published in 1994, is an eight-page ecology parable in Serbian that makes visual homage to Snoopy, Charlie Brown, and Woodstock in three panels. Customs seized five copies of the issue with the Peanuts reference and fourteen copies of the issue containing "Richie Bush." The stories were both published in the middle of their respective issues and no graphics from either story appeared on the covers.

The books were bound for Top Shelf Comics, and were included in the company’s order as samples, rather than merchandise it had ordered and planned to distribute.

The CBLDF retained Charleston attorney, Gregg Meyers in the matter, and challenged the seizure of the works by Customs. According to the Fund, this week Customs released the books and will be refunding the $250 filing fee that Top Shelf placed to challenge the seizure.

"This is great news," said CBLDF Executive Director Charles Brownstein in a release. "It's exactly the kind of victory we want, where reason prevails and no one has to go to court. It's always better to prevent a trial than defend a trial, and I'm pleased that the government felt the same way in this case and returned the materials that were wrongfully seized."

Though Customs had stated their reasons behind the seizure when the books were originally held, Brownstein told Newsarama that they offered no explanation upon their release. “They returned the books and refunded the bond, which can be interpreted as either an admission of error or an acknowledgment that the material wasn't worth making a literal federal case out of. Whatever Customs' reasons, we feel they made the right decision in letting these books go, thereby acknowledging that this work is protected speech.”

Meyers concurred in the release, stating, "I'd say that reaching a resolution with only a single shot fired reflects the realization by the government that the seizure shouldn't have happened. We appreciate that they changed their course."

Top Shelf publisher and CBLDF President Chris Staros added, "Despite the low dollar value of the books seized, the principal of this issue -- that of Customs overreaching its authority to judge what is parody and what is not -- was definitely worth fighting for. Hopefully, the victory in this case will help prevent future incidents of this nature, where a publisher would have much more to lose if, for example, an entire print run was seized."

Finally, since the incident didn’t go to court for a formal legal challenge, and no precedent was set, Brownstein said that he couldn’t rule out this type of thing happening again, at a different port with a different Customs agent, but he is optimistic that the message got across.

“My sense is that because it didn't go to court that this is an isolated incident, but it is an incident that should make Customs think twice before seizing constitutionally protected speech in the future.”

[AlexLothos]

I'm glad this ended quickly and quietly. No muss, no fuss. It's sad that it was an event in the first place, but it's cool that customs let it go.

I too hope that the message got across and this doesn't happen again somewhere else. Oy.

[Michael C Lorah]

Good news. Glad to hear that cooler heads have prevailed.

[LD18]

justice is served...or something like that

[lukabeast]

This is exactly the way this should have came out.

[Biggest Nimrod]

VICTOR-EEEE!!!

[cleazer]

Good to hear that common sense prevailed in the end.

[Prozac Man]

Looks like this case was just a bad call by a customs agent, and not an organized attack on free speech. We still have to keep an eye out though.

[Kavalier]

Told you so.

Sorry. couldn't resist.