PHILADELPHIA – A local television news anchor who lost her lawsuit for an alleged improper use of her image on commercial websites across the Internet is appealing her case to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.
Notice of the appeal was filed by counsel for “Good Day Philadelphia” anchor Karen Hepp, Samuel B. Fineman of Cohen Fineman, on Aug. 21, with the case now set to head to the Third Circuit court.
“Notice is hereby given that plaintiff, Karen Hepp, in the above-captioned case hereby appeals to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit from the orders dated and entered on June 5, 2020 and Aug. 3, 2020, respectively, and memoranda dated and entered on June 5, 2020 and Aug. 3, 2020, respectively, granting defendants Facebook, Inc., Imgur, Inc., Reddit, Inc. and WGCZ S.R.O.’s motions to dismiss plaintiff’s amended complaint,” Fineman said.
Hepp has taken issue with social sites like Facebook and Reddit for featuring an image taken without her knowledge on several commercial websites, including one on an ad for erectile dysfunction.
Hepp first filed her complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania on Sept. 4, suing Facebook, Imgur, Reddit, Giphy, WGCZ S.R.O. and the owners of various websites and media outlets, named in the lawsuit as Does 1-10, for alleged violation of the state’s Right of Publicity statute.
Hepp alleged that her co-workers informed her two years ago that a security camera caught a snapshot of her in a New York City convenience store. That photo is said to have been used in online ads for erectile dysfunction as well as dating websites and other avenues, according to the lawsuit.
The picture was also included in a Facebook ad that implored users to “meet and chat with single women,” based on the complaint. Imgur allegedly posted the photo with the word “milf,” an inappropriate term related to attractive women with kids.
Reddit allegedly featured the photo in a subgroup called r/obsf.
Hepp also alleged, “The photo was modified and featured on Giphy wherein a video appears in the background of a man – who is hiding behind a glass commercial freezer door and masturbating – to what would appear, from his perspective, to the backside of the plaintiff.”
Lastly, the picture also made its rounds on XNXX in the “milf” gallery.
Hepp asked the court to bar the defendants and their related entities from publishing the photo, and to make them remove the ones that are currently present on their sites. She also wanted the defendants to have to show how much money they made from using her image.
Several of the defendants have motioned to have themselves dismissed from the case. One of them, Imgur, took such action when it filed a response dismissal motion for lack of jurisdiction on Jan. 24.
Giphy, Inc., Reddit and Facebook filed similar motions to dismiss shortly thereafter – with Giphy alleging Hepp’s claims were prohibited by a lack of personal jurisdiction, Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act and were time-barred by the two-year statute of limitations, among other objections, before the company was successful in securing its dismissal motion last week.
Those motions to dismiss from Giphy, Reddit and Facebook proved successful on June 5. A later motion to dismiss from WGCZ was granted on Aug. 3 by U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania John M. Younge.
As a result of WGCZ being dismissed from the case, only John Doe defendants remained in the action. Younge cited federal case law in citing that an action against solely Doe defendants cannot proceed and dismissed the case in its entirety.
Prior to dismissal and for counts of violating the Pennsylvania Constitution and the Right to Publicity statute, the plaintiff was seeking a yet-to-be precisely determined award in excess of $10 million.
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania case 2:19-cv-04034
From the Pennsylvania Record: Reach Courts Reporter Nicholas Malfitano at nick.malfitano@therecordinc.com