Orange County Choppers Found Guilty of Copyright Infringement
Paul Teutul Sr. has been ordered to pay a small fortune for profiting off a picture of Mikey that was taken by someone else.
According to Page Six, the Orange County Choppers owner has been ordered to pay a photographer over $250,000 for using his work without permission.
Copyright infringement is no joke, and many photographers, illustrators and artists aggressively pursue people who attempt to profit from their work. The law protects these artists from being taken advantage of by imposing harsh penalties on those who use their artwork without permission.
According to the ruling, Teutul and his son Mikey were selling hoodies and t-shirts featuring an image taken by photographer Scott Gunnells. The photo of Mikey was also used on the American Chopper reality series without permission. In addition, the lawsuit claimed that Gunnells' picture had a logo on it that was removed before the photo was used to promote an exhibition featuring artwork by Mikey Teutul.
The judge in the case found Teutul guilty and ordered him to pay Gunnells $258,484.45 in damages for using his artwork without permission. Orange County Choppers, Discovery Inc., and American Chopper production company, Pilgrim Media Group, were all named in the lawsuit.
We reached out to OCC for comment and will update the story if we hear back.