In the case of
Grant Heilman Photography, Inc. vs. McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. before Judge Michael M. Baylson in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania a jury has found in favor of Grant Heilman and awarded them the amount of $127,087 for the unauthorized use of a total of 53 images.
In April 2012 Heilman filed suit against McGraw-Hill Companies for the unauthorized use of approximately 2,000 images going back as far as 1995. Judge Baylson chose to try this case in what is known as a “bellwether trial.” In the bellwether trial the oldest claim was in 1999.
When a judge elects to use the bellwether trials procedure, the judge and the parties generally select a representative sample of cases that will be fully prepared and tried to a jury. These selected cases are typically representative of issues that will arise in every injured person’s case. The goal of a bellwether process is to give all interested parties a good indication of what is likely to happen in future trials and provide the judge and the interested parties with enough information to determine whether groups of cases should be settled and what might be a reasonable dollar range for settlement.
The full trial took seven days. At the end of the presentation of evidence Judge Baylson asked jurors to answer nine questions known as “jury interrogatories” to determine whether the plaintiff, Grant Heilman had proven its case. To each question the jury answered in favor of the plaintiff.
The decision was entered on September 24, 2014. McGraw-Hill has 30 days to decide if they will appeal the ruling.
As a side note, on November 26, 2012, McGraw-Hill announced it was selling its entire
education division to
Apollo Global Management for $2.5 billion. On March 22, 2013 it announced it had completed the sale and the proceeds were for $2.4 billion cash.