Comic legend Stan Lee has announced that he has filed a lawsuit against Pow! Entertainment, CEO Shane Duffy, and Co-Founder Gill Champion. The lawsuit, which was filed today with the Los Angeles Superior Court, claims that the company conspired with a pair of its employees to steal his identity. Stan Lee is seeking $1 Billion in damages to his likeness as well as for the company not cluing him in on the company’s sale to Camsing International last year.
“Defendants conspired and agreed to broker a sham deal to sell POW! to a company in China and fraudulently steal Stan Lee’s identity, name, image, and likeness as part of a nefarious scheme to benefit financially at Lee’s expense,” the suit alleges. “Pursuant to their conspiracy and agreement, Defendants … knowingly made material misrepresentations of fact, and forged or fraudulently obtained a signature from Lee to give POW! Inc. the exclusive use of Lee’s identity, name, image, and likeness … and each of them knew that their objective was unlawful and they intended to aid each other in achieving that unlawful objective.” The suit notes the death last year of Joan B. Lee, the plaintiff’s wife of 70 years. “Upon her death,” it reads, “Lee at age 94 became the target of various unscrupulous businessmen, sycophant and opportunists who saw a chance to take advantage of Lee’s despondent state of mind, kind heart and devotion to his craft – a devotion that often allowed him to overlook the bad intentions of others when it came to his property.” He adds that Duffy and Champion “were two of the opportunists” and preyed “on his infirmities while he was in a state of despair.”
Stan Lee co-founded Pow! Entertainment back in 2001. The company set up their base office in Santa Monica, California at Metro-Goldwyn Mayer’s headquarters. The company has produced series such as Stripperella, Lightspeed, Who Wants to Be a Superhero?, Ultimo, Heroman, and The Reflection.
Information courtesy of Deadline Hollywood
