Lady Gaga wins ‘Judas’ copyright suit

A lawsuit in which pop star Lady Gaga was accused of ripping off a songwriter’s composition has been dismissed after a judge ruled that the songs in question were “utterly dissimilar”.

Singer Rebecca Francescatti, who filed the lawsuit at the US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, alleged that Gaga’s 2011 hit ‘Judas’ copied the music in and the title of her song, ‘Juda’, released 13 years before.

However, Judge Marvin Aspen ruled that the songs do not have common lyrics, had different themes and sounded nothing alike.

In a summary judgment, issued on June 17, Aspen concluded that “no reasonable fact finder” could detect similarities between the songs.

“Simply listening to the songs, as the law requires, reveals their utter lack of similarity,” Aspen wrote.

Francescatti filed the lawsuit in 2011, shortly after the release of Gaga’s album ‘Born this way’, on which the track ‘Judas’ appears.

The court heard that Francescatti worked with recording engineer Brian Gaynor, who went on to work with, and help pitch ideas to, Lady Gaga.

However, Aspen wrote that there was not enough evidence that Gaga could have heard or known about Francescatti's song before publishing ‘Judas’.

In a statement to the Chicago Tribune, Charles Ortner, Gaga’s attorney, said she was “pleased” that the court concluded, after a thorough analysis, that the lawsuit lacked “any basis in law or fact”.

Christopher Niro, an attorney for Francescatti, said the singer and her attorneys were disappointed by the ruling.

The case is not the first time Gaga has been in an IP-related dispute.

In October last year, WIPR reported that the singer, whose real name is Stefani Germanotta, had complained over a brand of jeans called Gagajeans.

Philip Scott, who designed the blue jeans, which had a horizontal zip open crotch, was forced to rename the product as Easy Access Pheiress Jeans.