Fornix Holdings LLC v. Unknown Party

District Court, D. Arizona·Decided June 15, 2023·No. 2:22-cv-01942·Unknown

Opinion

WO

Fornix Holdings LLC, et al., No. CV-22-01942-PHX-DJH

Plaintiffs, ORDER

v.

Unknown Party, et al.,

Defendants. Fornix Holdings LLC and CP Productions Incorporated (collectively “Plaintiffs”) have filed a Motion for Entry of Default Judgment (Doc. 62) against Defendants John Doe #1 d/b/a/ Daftsex.com (“DS”) and John Doe #2 d/b/a/ Pornwild.com (“PW”) (collectively “the Infringing Defendants”). The Infringing Defendants were served with the Complaint, Summons, and this Motion; however, they have not answered or otherwise appeared in this action. The Court must decide whether default judgment is proper under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 55. For the following reasons, the Court grants, in part, Plaintiffs’ Motion. The Court will enter declaratory relief against DS and PW and issue a permanent injunction against PW. I. BACKGROUND1 This matter stems from Plaintiffs’ copyright infringement claims against DS and PW. Plaintiffs have produced and distributed 967 adult entertainment photos and videos 1 The Court’s prior Orders contain extensive background information. (See Docs. 28; 41) The Court presumes the parties’ familiarity with case and thus provides only an abbreviated version of the background facts here. (“Works”), 157 of which are registered and protected by copyright. (Doc. 28 at 2). Plaintiffs allege DS and PW have stolen and promoted Plaintiffs’ Works on domain names owned and operated by DS and PW, respectively. (See generally Doc. 28 at 3–5). On November 23, 2022, the Court issued a Temporary Restraining Order (the “TRO”) (Doc. 28) that granted Plaintiffs injunctive relief against PW, denied Plaintiffs injunctive relief against DS, and granted Plaintiffs’ request for alternative service and expedited discovery. In granting Plaintiffs injunctive relief against PW, the Court (1) ordered Namecheap, Inc. (“Namecheap”)2 to immediately disable PW’s three domain names; and (2) ordered Defendant Cloudflare, Inc. (“Cloudflare”) to suspend all services to and place an administrative lock on PW’s three domain names. (Doc. 28 at 15).3 On December 6, 2022, the Court converted the TRO into a Preliminary Injunction (the “PI”) (Doc. 41) that also applied to a fourth domain name operated by PW.4 Once a party’s default has been entered, the district court has discretion to grant default judgment against that party. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 55(b)(2); Aldabe v. Aldabe, 616 F.2d 1089, 1092 (9th Cir. 1980). “When entry of judgment is sought against a party who has failed to plead or otherwise defend, a district court has an affirmative duty to look into its jurisdiction over both the subject matter and the parties.” In re Tuli, 172 F.3d 707, 712 (9th Cir. 1999). Once a court finds jurisdiction, it must consider: “(1) the possibility of prejudice to the plaintiff, (2) the merits of plaintiff's substantive claim, (3) the sufficiency of the complaint, (4) the sum of money at stake in the action; (5) the possibility of a dispute concerning material facts; (6) whether the default was due to excusable neglect, and (7) the 2 Namecheap was originally named as defendant in this case. The parties later stipulated to dismiss Namecheap as defendant (Doc. 65), which the Court granted. (Doc. 66).

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