N.J. Restaurant, Owners Pirated June 2021 PPV Boxing Match, Alleges Complaint

A Paramus, New Jersey, restaurant and its owners “willfully engaged” in wrongful acts when they intercepted the June 2021 pay-per-view broadcast of the Floyd Mayweather vs. Logan Paul exhibition boxing match for free, alleged Joe Hand Promotions’ Communications Act complaint Tuesday in U.S. District Court for New Jersey (docket 2:24-cv-06723). Four members of the Perides family, who own The Terrace at Biagio’s restaurant, knew or should have known that the interception and exhibition of the broadcast wasn’t “properly authorized,” said the complaint. The broadcast wasn’t for private viewing, nor was it for residential, noncommercial purposes, it said. The restaurant sold food and drinks during the broadcast, and the public display of the program was to entice patrons to the establishment to spend money while viewing it, it said. The Perideses intentionally pirated the program for "their own economic gain,” while legitimate establishments paid substantial sums for the proper commercial sublicense to show the broadcast to their patrons, it said. The complaint seeks maximum damages of $100,000 for the willful violation of Section 605 of the Communications Act, or alternatively the maximum of $50,000 for the willful violation of Section 553.