AIG and US Airways Seek to Cover Up Flight 1549 Recovery Photos

[johnastovall]

"Stephen Mallon might be sitting on some of the most newsworthy pictures never seen.Stephen, a New York City industrial photographer, was hired by Weeks Marine, the maritime crane company involved in the recovery of US Airways Flight 1549 from the Hudson River, to document the recovery process........


That's when the funny business started. Stephen put the pictures up on his website, where they were viewable for about a week. Then he got a correction from the NTSB: no, he could not "go live" with the pictures. So he took them down.
Two weeks later, the NTSB released them, so all but a couple went up again. Then a couple more had to come down. And so on. Then he got a letter from J. Supor & Son, a land-based crane company, saying they were asserting their rights to be considered his client, based on their ownership of Weeks Marine, which, you recall, had hired Stephen in the first place.
Then he got a letter from a law firm, not sent directly but passed to him by insurance giant AIG—yup, that AIG—asserting that Stephen has no rights to his pictures, and that the pictures absolutely can't be released to anyone, ever—not even news outlets for news purposes. AIG (through its lawyers) apparently seeks total suppression of the work, indefinitely."


Full story here...

[kenw]

key phrase "was hired by..."

if he was working under a typical contract, the lawyers are absolutely, positively correct.

even the IDEAS I have working for a company are theirs. It's been established many times over in court. same with photos i take at work in the course of my work. and if it isn't in the course of my work, i need authorization and that authorization plainly states that guess what? the pics can be (but aren't always) subject to the company's control.

it's their property, their right.

there's no conspiracy here, not even if AIG is involved.

[johnastovall]

Have you read the full story? It's more complicated than that and he was not hired by AIG.

[SevenAndMe]

It's a news event.
That should mean that showing the picutes is OK, right?

[kenw]

Originally Posted by SevenAndMe

It's a news event.
That should mean that showing the picutes is OK, right?

not if he was under hire. If he was not under contract, you are correct.

kenw added 3 Minutes and 44 Seconds later...Double Post Merged Below

AIG may be working in the background, but evidently they hold the liability insurance on the recovery firm that hired him. They control the recovery firm (their liability policy that is), the recovery firm (or Weeks) actually owns the shots. The fact that AIG sent the letter is superflous.

[Coelus]

Unless Mallon retained copyright to the images in the contract, which I doubt, they belong to the client. The NTSB could probably subpoena them as evidence for the investigation if they wanted. I don't know if that evidence would be public.

[Tom]

If the NTSB got them, it is possible that you could do a FOIA req to get them.

[Teddington]

Originally Posted by johnastovall

Full story here...[/URL]

Ahh, but the full story is not here. The letter is paraphrased in the article and only what the author wanted to include. I'm neither defending or asserting AIG may be in the right. Simply that we don't have all the facts or a complete understanding of what transpired and without that, any opinion is premature.