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Quentin Tarantino may be suing Gawker in California, but the Cayman Islands-based company could be beyond his reach.
Gawker Media Group Inc., which is being sued by Mr. Tarantino for allegedly leaking the script for “Hateful Eight,” a project in development, claims it is beyond the reach of the California-based lawsuit.
He sued for copyright infringement, claiming a link on a Gawker blog connected to a 146-page script for “Hateful Eight,” saying in his suit that Gawker “crossed the journalistic line by promoting itself to the public as the first source to read the entire screenplay illegally.”
However, Gawker claims in a responding court filing that California laws lack “… personal jurisdiction over (Gawker Media Group Inc.), a Cayman Islands corporation, which is not subject to general jurisdiction because it does not have any continuous and systematic contacts with California and is not subject to specific jurisdiction because it does not publish the website at issue in plaintiff's complaint and was not involved in any way with the researching, writing, editing, or publishing of the article that is the subject of plaintiff's complaint.”
Gawker continues: “GMGI has no operations or employees in California or elsewhere. Rather, it is a Cayman Islands holding company. Its sole assets are equity securities in its subsidiaries, one of which is defendant Gawker Media, LLC. In short, GMGI does not publish anything, including without limitation the website found at www.gawker.com.”