North Carolina Must Face Blackbeard Ship Footage Claim Again

The state of North Carolina can’t escape all of a videographer’s reintroduced lawsuit arguing it improperly violated his due process by putting his footage of Blackbeard’s sunken pirate ship in the public domain, a federal judge said.

Frederick Allen plausibly alleged the state took his property without due process after the US Supreme Court shot down an earlier version of his claim in 2020, the US District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina said in an opinion filed Aug. 30. The high court rejected Congress’ bid to override state sovereign immunity in copyright cases, but that didn’t negate ...