A High Court judge has found CD WOW in contempt of court and in
“substantial breach of copyright”. The e-tailer has
been ordered to pay a fine to the Crown plus damages and legal
costs. The ruling marks the culmination of almost six years of
legal action as the BPI has sought to prevent the online music
retailer from importing CDs illegally from the Far East. The BPI
(British Phonographic Institute) said it will seek
“significant damages” from CD WOW after this landmark
ruling on illegal imports. “We knew the verdict was always
going to be a negative one because we held our hands up to a
number of incidents where we could be deemed to have breached our
contract, even though it was unintentional,” said Henrik
Wesslen, CD WOW’s founder. “However,” he added,
“This is a harsher verdict than we would have hoped for and
we will be taking this further to fight this injustice.”
BPI general counsel, Roz Groome, stated, “This judgement
confirms that CD WOW have not only consistently flouted the law
in their business practices, but have flagrantly ignored the
undertakings that they themselves gave to the Court that they
would trade legally.” CD WOW on the other hand maintains
that it has never intentionally broken laws concerning parallel
importing and that any breaches have been a result of human error
in a warehouse that sends CDs and DVDs to consumers across all
copyright territories.
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