CLEVELAND (Legal Newsline) – Private lawyers are apparently signing up government clients for a new round of litigation against Netflix and Hulu.
The strategy of finding local governments willing to give out contingency fee contracts is becoming more and more popular for private lawyers. Close to 3,000 such contracts have been reached in the sprawling opioid litigation, and lawsuits over PFAS and vaping products have followed.
Now, the City of Maple Heights, Ohio, claims Netflix and Hulu have failed to pay it a video service provider fee of up to 5% of their gross revenue. The streaming companies deliver their content through broadband wireline facilities located at least in part in public rights-of-way, the Aug. 21 suit says.
“Defendants failed to apply for, and therefore never received, authorization from the Ohio director of commerce, and Defendants failed to provide 10 days’ advance, written notice to Plaintiff and other municipalities, and therefore have been and continue to provide video service throughout Ohio without legal authorization, and in contravention of the Ohio Revised Code,” the suit says.
Representing Maple Heights are DiCello Levitt of Ohio and Chicago, Nix Patterson of Texas, and Schneider Wallace of Texas and California.