Peter Beagle recovers rights to The Last Unicorn and his body of work
by Patch O'Furr
VOTE HERE for the Ursa Major Awards! From March 1-31, support furry creators.
Good news due to a few people fighting without much credit for years. Beagle's lawyer is a saint. https://t.co/hKfu8wXmh7
— Dogpatch Press (@DogpatchPress) March 23, 2021
A long road
In 2014, Peter’s manager was accused of fraud. The criticism led to a public relations and legal battle including me (see comment below story); Peter supported my defense, and followed me in suing the manager in 2015. It was a triangle and we both prevailed.
In 2019 I took dismissal of the manager’s claims against me and a judgement of $32K.
Peter proved he was a victim of fraud, elder abuse, and defamation by the manager. He was awarded $332K in damages.
Peter’s creative rights were still tied up, until his team just sent the news he is entirely free with a message for Peter’s supporters.
The new story settles a creators rights fight that split off to federal bankruptcy court after fraud issues resolved for victims in state civil court. I won a $32,000 judgement there in 2019. It took a long time to finish the rest. This is a good day for Beagle.
— Dogpatch Press (@DogpatchPress) March 23, 2021
Launching the Beagleverse! Please help promote for Peter on social media.
Use hashtags #beagleverse and #peterbeagleverse, and make sure to use correct handles for his accounts:
- Twitter: @Peterbeaglever1
- Instagram: @peterbeagleverse
- Facebook (only use the genuine page, not a “Peter S Beagle” page controlled by the former manager.)
Peter is at work now after many projects had been put on hold. His new website (www.beagleverse.com) will have hints of things to come, news updates, and a mailing list to get the happenings in your inbox.
Artists: Protect yourselves, b/c the world is full of awful people.
People Who Are Protectors of Artists: Don't be like Connor Cochran; be like James Null and Kathleen Hunt. pic.twitter.com/28nbdMthO2— deadline deTERMINATOR (@LisaDJenkins) March 24, 2021
Hints about the stakes of the fight.
The press release is from overcoming parts of the story most fans will never know about fighting abuse.
I can hint about something a wise old man told me after the judgements. In The Lord of the Rings, Sauron thought the Ring would always give him power because nobody would truly give it up. An abuser’s promises can be like that: Fame, fortune, fans… world tours, your name in lights! Giving it up breaks the spell.
Kathleen Hunt, Peter’s attorney, helped him because he “suffered from a host of injuries including fraud”; she took on the case pro bono when it became “increasingly clear that Beagle was being abused… Peter wanted his reputation and his life’s work back.”
To Peter’s team, elder abuse is a “far too common and sinister crime. One of Beagle’s future projects will be to advocate and raise awareness about elder abuse.”
Big dreams can happen again, but these ones won’t lose what really matters.
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Maybe I’m missing something, but how is it you’re involved?
I’ve added the following to Wikifur.
Beagle’s career was dogged by exploitation and mismanagement going back to 1982’s The Last Unicorn movie. Attempts to recover his rights collided with furry fandom. [9][10] In 2015, furry news reporter Patch O’Furr was named as party to a lawsuit by Beagle’s then-manager Connor Cochran. Whistleblowers were accused of defamation for joining public claims about Cochran’s history of fraud.
Patch sued Cochran back, and the action tripled when investors and Beagle sued Cochran too. Cochran responded by suing Beagle and his girlfriend, suing Beagle’s lawyer, claiming authorship of Beagle’s work, and supporting an attempt to take conservatorship of Beagle. Patch was supported by Beagle and persisted through winning thousands in sanctions during the battle, and seeing a judge call Cochran’s actions “frivolous”.[11] Cochran was dropped as a client by 5 lawyers until he represented himself and dropped his defamation claims; his other legal maneuvers failed and he went bankrupt.
In 2019 Patch was vindicated with a judgement of $32,000. Cochran was convicted of fraud and Beagle was awarded $332,000 in damages.[12] Fandom was key to supporting a creator against elder abuse; Kathleen Hunt, Peter’s attorney, also took on the case pro bono when it became “increasingly clear that Beagle was being abused… Peter wanted his reputation and his life’s work back.” In 2021, Beagle recovered his rights.[13][14]