According to the judgment passed by the New York judge, the two democratic political consultants are allowed to pursue their lawsuit against the founders of Huffington Post. This lawsuit claims that the founders of the news website actually stole the plaintiff’s idea, and allege the founders of breaking their legal contract of starting the website together. The attorneys of the Huffington Post co-founders, Arianna Huffington and Kenneth Lerer, had requested court to dismiss this complaint filed by the consultants, Peter Daou and James Boyce.
An oral argument took place between both the parties on Tuesday, under the supervision of Manhattan Supreme Court Justice, Charles Ramos. After hearing both the arguments, the judge announced that he disapproves the request of dismissing the case, and instead allows the plaintiff to continue their legal action for idea misappropriation and breach of contract. Ramos declared that both the parties should proceed with the lawsuit and discover the depth of the raised issue. According to the spokesperson of the AOL Huffington Post Media Group, despite this decision, the company is still very confident of winning the case in the end. AOL recently acquired Huffington Post for $315 million this February.
The actual lawsuit against Huffington Post was launched by Daou and Boyce back in November last year. The lawsuit emphasized on the several meetings, conversations, and emails which were exchanged in 2004, after which allegedly "Huffington and Lerer breached their obligations to Peter and James, excluded them from the venture, and claimed credit for the ideas and contributions to the site that Peter and James had given them." Further the complaint informed that in November 2004, Boyce delivered Huffington a memorandum entitled "1460," which were the number of days left in presidential elections as Daou and Boyce both helped in Senator John Kerry's presidential campaign of 2004.
The lawsuit also mentions that this memo was the foundation of Boyce’s stance, which he present to Huffington on December 3, 2004, and put forward "a specific combination of elements that have always been central and signature elements of the Huffington Post." The day after this presentation Boyce, Daou and Lerer allegedly joined Huffington at a breakfast at her home, where the complainers allege that they "all shook hands and Huffington said: 'It will be great to work together.'
Requesting for a dismissal of this lawsuit, the lawyers of Huffington had alleged that plaintiffs did not have finalized any deal with the defendants.
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