Condemned Women

(1938)   Tags: RKO

O’ROURKE v. RKO Radio Pictures

The plaintiff alleges the defendant has stolen from his story.  Plaintiff seeks damages and an accounting of the profits derived from the production and exhibition of defendant’s motion picture “Condemned Women”. The plaintiff alleges that the story of that picture was unlawfully copied and appropriated in whole or in a substantial part from a story “Girls’ Reformatory” which he had written and submitted to the defendant for purchase. The defendant denies that any part of “Condemned Women” was taken from “Girls’ Reformatory”, and, while admitting access to the script of “Girls’ Reformatory”, says that the story upon which “Condemned Women” was based was purchased from one Lionel Houser many months before the plaintiff’s story was submitted to it or even fully written.

Judgment: I conclude that the defendant has not used the plaintiff’s story as the source from which it drew in whole or in any substantial part for its photoplay. The plaintiff’s bill is therefore dismissed.