LOS ANGELES – Evil Angel Productions and Jules Jordan Productions got a little closer to collecting their multi-million dollar piracy win against Kaytel Distribution, Leisure Time Canada Inc. and their principal Alain Elmaleh yesterday when U.S. District Court Judge S. James Otero, who had presided over the trial last August, denied the defendants' motion for a new trial.
"The judge reduced the judgment [for Jules] to $2.9 million from $5.5 million, and I think Al's [Gelbard, Evil Angel's attorney] got knocked down from $11 million to $7 million," noted Jordan's attorney Sean Macias, "but the great part about it is, he denied their [defendants'] motion for a new trial, so that stands, and the only outstanding motion is ours for $800,000 for attorneys fees and costs, and that gets heard on the 7th."
With the results of the trial now "set in stone," Elmaleh's only recourse would be to appeal the verdict to the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. Such a move, however, would require the defendants to prove that Judge Otero had made reversible error in his handling of the case – an attempt that Macias thinks would be fruitless.
"They can still appeal it, but they've been denied a motion for a new trial, so we're happy," Macias said.
In addition to filing an appeal, Elmaleh would also have to put up a "good faith" bond to secure the trial verdict should he lose the appeal.
"They've got to put up a bond, and now that the judgment has been entered, we can start collecting," Macias told AVN. "They have to put up one-and-a-half times the value, so that's a little bit over five and a half million just for our [Jordan's] case; they have to put a 10% bond on that, but they have to have at least $5 million of assets or something. So everybody's real excited about this. We're in the last stage of our victory. It feels good."
The defendants would have to file their notice of appeal within 45 days of Otero's denial of the motion for a new trial. At press time, Elmaleh's attorney, Michael Plotkin, could not be reached for comment as to whether his client planned to file such a motion.
