CityView Magazine

28 Februar y 2021 "at's kind of my No. 1 job – advocating for other artists, writers, composers and soware developers, musicians, videographers just like me. Because right now states can infringe on their intellectual property pretty much without consequence." In March 2020, the Supreme Court ruled against Allen based on precedence and said that states do have sovereign immunity in copyright and cannot be sued for copyright damages. "e only relief that's le is injunctive relief, which is aer the fact. e damage is done," Allen said. "So in a weird twist of the American legal system, we have filed a motion for reconsideration. "Because the United States Constitution guarantees me exclusive rights to my writings and discoveries. It's called the copyright clause. But I have a constitutional right with no remedy right now." A motion for reconsideration has been filed, essentially asking that Allen has had his constitutional rights violated as a result of the ruling and that he needs relief. "So we will see what Judge (Terrence) Boyle decides to do," he said. "I will say in the next few months he will probably rule. at has consumed a great deal of my time and interest since 2013." He estimated that he has spent "in excess of $350,000. When the case went to court, North Carolina asserted that it was protected by sovereign immunity. U.S. District Court Judge Boyle rejected that claim. Before the litigation reached a decision on whether North Carolina violated Allen's copyright, the state appealed. e 4th Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously overturned Boyle, so Allen appealed to the Supreme Court. Currently, Allen serves as vice chair on the board of e Arts Council of Fayetteville/Cumberland County. He said he finds it a pleasure to serve because "e Arts Council makes Fayetteville and Cumberland County such a better place to live." Because of COVID-19, he was unable to dive as oen as he wanted over the summer. He looks forward to returning to the ocean this summer. Returning to the undersea world of his beloved sharks and sunken shipwrecks. "I've been in the water all my life. I'm more comfortable in the water than I am on land," he said. "I have phantom pain all the time. When I dive, I don't have it." 28 February 2021 Fascinating FAYETTEVILLE "It's an ongoing process. ere are reminders every day. It just becomes a part of your life," he said of living without a limb. "You're never going to be back where you were before. You're going to get close. Everything changes to some degree. I was a really good videographer. But that takes two hands. I can still do it, but if I have a project, I have someone else shoot." As he put it with a little laugh, "I'm in the scratch-and-dent department." It would be a year before Allen weaned himself off the drugs he took for pain. And it would be 2013 before he would get up in the morning and, as he said, "start to feel human." Like a shark in the ocean blue, Allen has adapted, which has helped him survive and thrive in his daily life. "It has definitely hurt," he said of his video production company. "ere are jobs I won't take." Last year, the National Geographic Channel aired underwater footage that Allen filmed from the wreckage of Blackbeard's Queen Anne's Revenge on the television program "Drain the Oceans." Next summer, he said, Nautilus Productions is providing footage during Shark Week on e Discovery Channel. As for his pending Supreme Court lawsuit against the state of North Carolina, he said, "I've always been an advocate for photographers and videographers for protecting their work and copyrighting their work. I've been doing that for 20 years, anyway. And then I get in a copyright battle with the state of North Carolina and that ended up in United States Supreme Court, and it continues now. The Supreme Court ruled against Allen's case in which he sued North Carolina for publishing his videos and a photo of the Blackbeard shipwreck. A motion for reconsideration has been filed.

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