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A Spanish judge has ordered Warner Bros. to pay 25,000 euros in damages to a Moroccan businessman because his photo appeared alongside images of the Gambino mafia family in a 2016 thriller starring Ben Affleck as a forensic accountant and mathematician.
The plaintiff, who had originally demanded 250,000 euros from the studio, claimed that his morale and business were affected by his connection to the mob in the film The Accountant.
The man, whose name was withheld in court, lives in Valencia, eastern Spain, and said his son had notified him of his inadvertent appearance in the film.
In its ruling, the Valencian court affirms that the plaintiff’s face can be seen for just one second in a 115-minute film. It also acknowledges that Warner Bros. claims the photo was taken from a genuine FBI arrest warrant issued for the plaintiff in connection with an alleged 2004 wire fraud.
However, the court ruled that the man’s photograph had been used in the film “without any consent, whether tacit or explicit” and that it had appeared under an inscription labeled “suspected associates of the Gambino family.”
The citation of the photo and the inscription, according to the court, damaged his reputation.
The judge awarded the man 25,000 euros in damages, but rejected his claim for lost profits, arguing that it had not been proven that he suffered financially as a result of the use of his image in the film.
He also noted that the plaintiff’s photo had circulated online as part of an investigation into the alleged fraud, and that he had spent time in prison in Spain.
However, the judge said that the plaintiff had never consented to the use of his photograph in the film.
“Please note that even if it is a fantasy film, the plaintiff is not a professional actor who will lose nothing by pretending to be a criminal, but rather a person beyond the art world and therefore someone who is very influenced how it is presented and how its image is used ”is emphasized in the court decision.
Source: ΑΠΕ-ΜΠΕ
