Stephen Slesinger Inc

There appears to be more money than honey in the pot of Winnie the Pooh. Think, think, think . . . billions. A family-owned company that receives royalties from the sale of Pooh merchandise claimed Tuesday that Walt Disney Co. has cheated it out of $35 million by failing to report at least $3 billion in Pooh-related revenue since 1983.

There appears to be more money than honey in the pot of Winnie the Pooh. Think, think, think . . . billions. A family-owned company that receives royalties from the sale of Pooh merchandise claimed Tuesday that Walt Disney Co. has cheated it out of $35 million by failing to report at least $3 billion in Pooh-related revenue since 1983.

Walt Disney Co. has won an appeals court ruling that protects the Burbank entertainment giant's trademarks to the valuable Winnie the Pooh characters. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington upheld a decision by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office that blocked Stephen Slesinger Inc.'s challenges to Disney's control of the trademark for the Hundred Acre Wood clan. The ruling appears to end a 21-year legal odyssey against Disney by Stephen Slesinger's family.

The two sides in the long-running royalty dispute over the Winnie the Pooh characters have ended settlement talks, ensuring that complicated federal copyright litigation will continue. Walt Disney Co., which generates about $1 billion in annual revenue from the sale of Pooh products, informed a federal magistrate last month that it would not participate in settlement talks with the family that owns the licensing rights to the characters. Attorneys representing Stephen Slesinger Inc.

A Los Angeles judge said he wanted to reconsider an independent auditor's report that Walt Disney Co. had almost fully paid for rights to the Winnie the Pooh character despite a licensor's allegations of millions of dollars in underpayments. In his tentative ruling, Superior Court Judge Ernest Hiroshige questioned the finding that Disney owed Stephen Slesinger Inc. just $11,000 in royalties stemming from a 1983 licensing agreement, Slesinger attorney Bonnie Eskenazi said.

A Los Angeles judge Tuesday said he wanted to reconsider an independent auditor's report that Walt Disney Co. had almost fully paid for rights to the Winnie the Pooh character despite a licensor's allegations of millions of dollars in underpayments. In his tentative ruling, Superior Court Judge Ernest Hiroshige questioned the finding that Disney owed Stephen Slesinger Inc. just $11,000 in royalties stemming from a 1983 licensing agreement, Slesinger attorney Bonnie Eskenazi said.

The Supreme Court declined Monday to decide whether the granddaughter of A.A. Milne, the creator of Winnie the Pooh, can recapture control of the copyright for stories featuring the popular children's character. Milne wrote the Pooh books from 1924 to 1928 and granted a license to Stephen Slesinger in 1930. Slesinger, in turn, granted his rights to Stephen Slesinger Inc. The firm sublicensed certain rights to the Pooh works to Walt Disney Co.

A Los Angeles federal court judge has sent the 12-year-old battle over royalties from the sale of Winnie the Pooh merchandise back to a state court. The decision places the case back on track for a trial over whether Walt Disney Co. shortchanged Stephen Slesinger Inc. on royalties due from the sale of Pooh merchandise. The case had been transferred to federal court this year to decide whether the granddaughter of Pooh creator A.A.

The owners of merchandising rights for Winnie the Pooh characters, whose 14-year-old case against Walt Disney Co. was dismissed last year, asked a California appeals court to reinstate their case. A Los Angeles superior court judge tossed Stephen Slesinger Inc.'s lawsuit last year after concluding that the family-owned company illegally obtained evidence from Disney's trash. That ruling spared Burbank-based Disney the loss of its top-earning character and hundreds of millions in damages.

Walt Disney Co. is facing a new legal front in its battle over the right to the Winnie the Pooh characters. Stephen Slesinger Inc., which owns the merchandising rights to the characters and traces its stake to a 1930 agreement with Pooh creator A.A. Milne, is seeking to cancel the U.S. trademarks of 25 Pooh-related names obtained by Disney since 1996. Disney "was not the owner of the registered marks at the time that these filings were made," Slesinger said of the trademark applications.

Walt Disney Co. is being sued by a shareholder who says the second-largest U.S. media company didn't disclose that it was being sued. Disney shareholder Aaron Kohn filed a securities fraud suit in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles that claims the company didn't reveal a 1991 lawsuit over Winnie the Pooh franchise rights until a May Securities and Exchange Commission filing. The suit claims Disney shares fell 42% from May 15 to Aug. 5 "as the case received greater and greater publicity."