ExtortionLetterInfo Forums
ELI Forums => Getty Images Letter Forum => Topic started by: kstwin on October 23, 2014, 12:39:32 AM
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My father in law (FIL) received a settlement demand letter from David Lowe, Esq.(Seattle, WA) representing Signatours Corporation. It is an obvious "form letter." The situation is, my husband posted a craigslist ad for his father's time share. Via google images he used a picture of the community pool at the resort among 6 other imagines that were our own. By using a fake email to respond to the ad they got the name and phone number of my in laws. Four months later, the demand letter. First letter was rec'd via certified mail. The attachment referenced was not our craigslist ad, it was some other poor victims from 2013. As naive as he is, my FIL called the law firm and through conversation the figured out they attached the wrong file to the letter. So they emailed him the correct attachment and evidence of the email of how they obtained proof of ownership. They demanded $6,000. My FIL offered $1,500, they rejected it. Now demanding $3,000 in 3 business days. Now some of my questions:
- The copyright is filed with Sunspots. They have mutual owners. How can Signatours be the ones claiming the infringement? Some prepaid legal told him via the mutual ownership it doesn't matter. Also the copyright is "cd of digital images." How do we even know if this image is part of it?
I noticed they have filed 6 lawsuits in the past week. How can we see the details of these cases? I've searched and it appears we need a PACER account??
- My FIL has said too much to them. Are we past the point of no return? He just wants to pay the $3,000 and move on. After reading through this forum I feel we would have had options if he never picked up the phone.
My FIL has mentioned "my son may have done the post." I'm afraid they will demand from us. The latest email contained a contract to sign. I want all of our name indemnified. FIL thinks its unnecessary. What do you think?
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This all makes me sick. This image did not take away from their business, it was posted for a couple of weeks. The unit was rented under market market value of the resort, no one profited from this picture. We've learned a painful lesson. Sunspots and Signatours are predatory. Sunspots has horrible reviews and they don't even have any business on the resort anymore. I remember years ago they were everywhere. Obviously their horrible reviews have done them in and now they are resorting to this trolling scheme. Would something like this hold up in court? I would also like to "out" these folks.
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Welcome to the forum and the wonderful world of settlement demand letters. I have to admit that I have not heard of any letters from signatories Corporation or sunspot. I have looked in pacer and found the six cases you are referring to and them in the process of downloading them and making them available.
Since these people do appear to be filing lawsuits and if you say you are among those they are targeting I would recommend getting a lawyer. You may wish to consider contacting Oscar as I do not think there are any out there with more experience when it comes to handling settlement demand letters and these type of cases.
I will post the cases for you to view shortly
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Here are the 6 lawsuits, I have uploaded them to my Scribd account.
https://www.scribd.com/collections/6615955/Signatours-Lawsuits
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Thank you Greg! After reviewing the cases, it feels as though Signatours takes pictures of resorts for the sake of copyrighting. I hope to get in contact with some of the defendants and hear about their experience.
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Well I got a hold of one the defendants. He was pretty heated stating its all bull shit and they are squeezing money out of thousands. He gave me the name of someone in his office that is handling it because "doesn't give a shit." Haven't heard back from her.
Also appears the case filings have companies involved. Even the cases with individual names I have found that they have an active registered company. Probably targeting who they take to court.
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I spoke with another defendant. Their situation is different. They purchased a vacation rental from a friend. The previous owner had a contract with Sunspots to manage the property. Sunspots will create webpages that appear to be direct with the resort, such as ABC Lodge. Then the contract is over and a new owner assume the photos are theirs. Unfortunately they copyrighted the photos instead of giving rights to their actual clients.
She was first contacted via letter in 2013. I can't imagine how long they've been at this and how many they have forced into settlement at least $3,000 each.
The lawyer for Signatours says he will be filing 5 more lawsuits next week. "He does what the client wants." Supposedly Sunspots is out of business, hence everything ran in Signatours name.
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Are Sunspots and Signatours the same? I noticed in some of the filings the copyright hold was listed as Sunspot. If they are not the same Sunspot would have had to transfer all rights to the images to Signatours.
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They have the same ownership. There are 5 or more 'vacation rentals' type companies all the same ownership.