by Peter Smith
LANSING, Michigan (LifeSiteNews.com) – A late-term abortion chain has threatened to sue the pro-life Center for Bio-ethical Reform for copyright infringement, because it juxtaposed the clinic’s promotional video with real video of an abortion being performed.
Pro-life blogger Jill Stanek reports that the Northland Family Planning Centers in Michigan are none too pleased that footage of a late-term baby being actually dismembered has been spliced with shots from their advertizing video about how “everyday good women” get abortions.
The CBR video is entitled “The Most Shocking (graphic imagery), Four Minute, Abortion Debate You Will Ever See” and has been posted since January at Pro-lifeTube.com [Warning: Extremely Graphic]
A description below the CBR video explains: “This Angel of Light video combats the lies of Northland Family Planning with the horrible visual truth of what abortion is and does to a living baby.”
Stanek says that Northland’s attorneys have sent a cease-and-desist letter to CBR, alleging that posting the video violated U.S. digital copyright laws, because Northland holds the registered copyright to the “Everyday Good Women Choose Abortion” footage. The March 18 letter of Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP warns that they could face civil penalties of $150,000 for each posting and potential criminal liability as well.
“Northland is a late-term abortion chain of 3 mills in Michigan that aborts babies up to 24 weeks old. CBR merely showed what that looks like. I thought truth in advertising was a good thing?” remarked Stanek.
The Thomas More Law Center, a Palo Alto-based public interest firm, is representing CBR and told the firm representing Northland that they would be happy to bring the matter to court. The letter from TMLC senior trial counsel Robert Muise asserted that the Northland material in the CBR video fulfills the “fair use” doctrine in US copyright law, and warned Northland would be “reckless” to follow through on “hollow threats to sue them.”
CBR’s Gregg Cunningham explained in a lengthy email quoted by Stanek that they were just giving viewers an opportunity to see what happens “down the hall” from the rosy clinic office of the Northland narrator.
“Without saying a word, we simply show viewers the reality which Northland’s narrator struggles to distort. Is abortion an expression of ‘love’ or a vicious act of violence?”
Cunningham said viewers must decide whether to believe what they hear “or what they see – with their own eyes.”
Read the full details here at JillStanek.com
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