(Trinidad Express) Government has initiated legal proceedings against Prof Brian Copeland and two associates—Marcel Byron and Keith Maynard over the rights of the (Genesis G-Pan).
The claim was filed by the State before the High court last Friday.
In its claim, the State is contesting that the Government funded the creation of the G-Pan and Percussive Harmonic Instrument (PHI) spending TT$33,764,000 to date on the project.
Under the People’s National Movement (PNM) government, led by Patrick Manning, it was agreed that government would fund the research and development of the steelpan by Copeland.
Attached to the lawsuit are a number of letters and Cabinet notes which state that all intellectual rights and patents would remain vested in the name of the Government of Trinidad and Tobago.
Also attached to the claim is a letter from Copeland dated April 21, 2006 addressed to Sandra Marchack, former permanent secretary in the Office of the Prime Minister where he enclosed a draft agreement for the project which states “…GORTT has reserved unto itself for its exclusive use and benefit all intellectual property rights in the project and in all research and concept, design, improvements, development and further inventions, whether patentable or not (inventions) made in connection with the project”.
Despite all agreements previously made, on May 13, 2009, Copeland wrote to Manning informing him that in order to treat with the demands of the intellectual property a company—Panadigm Innovations Ltd (PIL) was created in the name of former PNM parliamentary secretary Junia Regrello and Copeland with Ronald DeFour as corporate secretary.
The State is demanding among other things an order directing that each of the defendants will immediately cease representing whether through themselves, their servants or agents that they are the owners of the invention known as PHI.
Speaking to the Express yesterday on the matter, Attorney General Anand Ramlogan said this action was necessary to protect the pan.
“No one person was responsible for these creations. These are post graduate UWI students and members of staff worked on the research project on the understanding that this was a labour of love for the benefit of our country. The State invested heavily in this project and it would be a dereliction of duty if I ignored or failed to act on legal advice provided,” said Ramlogan.
Queen’s Counsel Vincent Nelson will lead attorney Devesh Maharaj and Daniel Solomon in the matter.