Sam Smith & Normani Can't Recover $700,000 Legal Bill After Losing Copyright Lawsuit, Judge Says

Six months later Sam Smith and Normani won a copyright lawsuit over their 2019 hit “Dancing With a Stranger,” a federal judge is refusing to make their accuser pay back their legal fees — a bill the stars say topped $700,000.

Smith and Normani argued they should not be forced to pay the huge bill they were handed to fend off the “frivolous and frivolous” lawsuit, which claimed the duo had copied a little-known 2015 song of the same name when they created the “Dancing.”

While U.S. District Judge Wesley L. Hsu dismissed the suit last year, ruling on Monday (March 18) that the case was not so frivolous as to warrant punishing the accuser by paying the stars' huge legal bill.

“Plaintiff's allegations were neither frivolous nor objectively unreasonable,” the judge wrote, calling the lawsuit a “narrow and difficult case” in a “controversial area of ​​copyright law.”

Lawyers for Smith and Normani had argued that the suit was just a “gamble”, filed against the stars with “hopes of a huge payout”. However, Judge Hsu said on Monday that there was “no evidence” of such bad intent on the part of the prosecutors.

The case was filed in 2022 by songwriters Jordan Vincent, Christopher Miranda and Rosco Banlaoi, who claimed that “Dancing” was “strikingly similar” to their 2015 track of the same name. In their complaint, they said it was “beyond any real doubt' that the song had been copied.

But in September, Judge Hsu said that was actually very doubtful. Granting Smith's and Normani's motion for an immediate dismissal of the lawsuit, the judge said the songs simply weren't similar — and criticized the plaintiffs for manipulating them to make them sound more alike.

“Allowing the copyright plaintiffs to prevail . . . by twisting the chords, recalibrating the tempo, and changing the pitch of the defendant's song to make it more like the plaintiffs would lead the courts to consider two very dissimilar musical compositions,” the judge wrote. at that time.

Unlike most forms of American litigation, winners in copyright lawsuits are often able to legally recoup the money they spent on lawyers fighting the case. Judges grant such requests in cases where a lawsuit should not have been brought or litigated too aggressively, and awarding fees can serve as a strong deterrent against future contested lawsuits.

In an October motion seeking $732,202 in fees, attorneys for Smith and Normani argued that Vincent, Miranda and Banlaoi's case was exactly the kind of frivolous litigation that should be prevented. They argued that songwriters and their lawyers had used aggressive tactics to advance flawed copyright claims that would be bad for all musicians.

“Plaintiff has attempted to monopolize unprotected elements that are common property to all,” attorneys for Smith and Normani wrote at the time. “Claims like the plaintiff's here threaten to defraud the public sector and limit the creation of new projects.”

But in Monday's ruling, Judge Hsu was not convinced. He called Smith and Normani's arguments “general reasoning” that would lead to many such awards in future copyright lawsuits.

“Yes, plaintiff's counsel aggressively prosecuted the case,” the judge wrote. “Plaintiff's conduct in this litigation does not rise to the level that requires deterrence.”

Judge Hsu ruled that Smith and Normani could recover their legal “expenses” from the plaintiffs, but such awards are typically far less than attorneys' fees. In earlier court filings, attorneys for Smith and Normani estimated such costs at $10,173.

Lawyers for either side did not immediately return requests for comment on Tuesday (March 19).