On December 17, court of general jurisdiction rendered a precedent-setting ruling on the lawsuit filed by “Investigative Journalists” NGO versus the founder of 1in.am.
As we have reported, the reason for bringing the legal action were eight pieces of Hetq.am, the online edition of “Investigative Journalists”, which had been reprinted by 1in.am without proper citing. “Investigative Journalists” demanded from the founder of 1in.am, “Skizb Media Kentron” LLC, to add relevant links to all the disputed pieces and to pay compensation in the amount of 200,000 AMD (about 350 euros). The lawsuit was filed to the Court of General Jurisdiction of Kentron and Nork-Marash Administrative Districts of Yerevan on January 16, 2014; the hearings of the case started on April 9 and ended on December 3 (see YPC Weekly Newsletter, December 1-7, 2014).
The December 17 court ruling partially secured the suit of “Investigative Journalists”. The court obliged the respondent to compensate 100,000 AMD and pay off the plaintiff’s court expenses of 158,000 AMD.
The court delivered no judgment on the other claim of “Investigative Journalists”, as in the course of the month-long litigation 1in.am had already modified the content in question adding the appropriate references to the disputed pieces.
Notably, this is a precedent-setting court decision, as this was the first litigation between media outlets in Armenia after the RA Law “On Copyright and Related Rights” was amended in September 2013. The amendments establish conditions for full or partial reproduction of print/online media pieces by another print/online media, as well as material compensation for damage in case of violation of these conditions.
