Photo Credit: Junta de Andalucia / CC by 2.0
A federal judge rules the plaintiff’s expert witness is unqualified and tosses a lawsuit accusing Karol G and DJ Tiësto of copyright infringement.
In Miami, a federal judge has thrown out a case accusing Karol G and DJ Tiësto of copyright infringement in their 2021 hit, “Don’t Be Shy.” A ruling on Wednesday from Judge Cecilia M. Altonaga granted summary judgment to Karol G and Tiësto, also dismissing claims against Atlantic Records, Kobalt, Sony Music Publishing, and Warner Records.
Cuban-American composer Rene Lorente-Garcia sued in 2023, alleging that “Don’t Be Shy,” Karol G’s first English-language song, copied the harmony, melody, and rhythm of his 1998 song, “Algo Diferente.”
Lorente-Garcia’s lawyers countered an expert witness brought in by the defendants—copyright litigation expert Dr. Lawrence Ferrara—with their own: Richie Viera, a Latin music producer and former A&R executive at Capitol Records. But Judge Altonaga says Viera is not a qualified musicology expert.
“While his CV highlights substantial experience in the business side of the Latin music industry, […] none of these roles involves the core competencies of forensic musicology: transcribing compositions, analyzing protectable expression or applying comparative methodologies to determine similarities,” wrote Judge Altonaga.
Without an expert musicologist on their side, the judge said Lorente-Garcia’s attorneys would have needed to provide evidence that the writers of “Don’t Be Shy” had access to their client’s earlier song. But the evidence, according to the judge, “reveals little more than ‘Algo Diferente’s presence in the digital ether, one among millions of songs.” Therefore, she determined, “no reasonable jury” could determine that Karol G and Tiësto had heard the song.
“This was a misguided case that never should have been brought,” said Donald Zakarin of Pryor Cashman, who represents Tiësto and Karol G, in addition to the label and publisher defendants. “There was no possibility of access and […] the claimed ‘similarities’ were commonplace musical building blocks found in multiple pre-existing works.”
“It is just wrong that successful songwriters and artists are so frequently subjected to objectively baseless claims that are expensive to fight,” Zakarin continued. “But fighting these claims is the right thing to do, and we are grateful to our clients and their representatives for standing up to protect all songwriters.”
Copyright, Feature Story, Music Industry News, Music Law, 1:24-cv-23066
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