Virgina Vallejo, a former Columbian journalist living in asylum in the United States, filed a lawsuit on August 24, 2018, claiming that the producers of the series “Narcos” infringed copyrights covering her best-selling memoir in which she narrated her romantic relationship with former drug lord Pablo Escobar.
Vallejo’s complaint claims the series depicted her through a character named Valeria Valdez, in addition to many detailed scenes throughout the show’s first season which “clearly came from her memoir” titled “Loving Pablo, Hating Escobar.” The complaint explains: “Without question, defendants intended not only to misappropriate the most valuable and gripping portions of Vallejo’s memoir as the gravamen of ‘Narcos,’ but went even further by adopting a character whose name and characteristics all clearly associate with Vallejo’s notoriety, goodwill and publicity rights — all in a deliberate and unbridled effort to increase the economic value of the show.”
This suit alleges defendants infringed U.S. copyrights that Vallejo registered on both the U.S. and Mexican versions of her memoir, as well as unfair competition under federal law and Florida common law (the state in which the suit has been filed).
The case is Vallejo v. Narcos Productions LLC, case number 1:18-cv-23462, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.
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