SALT LAKE CITY (BP)–A copyright infringement lawsuit relating to the secretive nature of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, First Amendment freedom of speech rights and the Internet’s informational content has been settled pending court approval.
Ex-Mormons Jerald and Sandra Tanner, who have spent 40 years challenging Mormonism through their Utah Lighthouse Ministry (ULM), have agreed to destroy copies of a Mormon handbook they posted on their www.utlm.org website. The 17 pages in question dealt with church disciplinary procedures, and in particular how people can get their names removed from Mormon church rolls. The closely guarded book is not available to the public or even general church membership.
The couple also agreed to remove links to — or any mention of — Internet sites carrying the Church Handbook of Instruction.
In exchange, the church agreed to drop its claims for damages and attorneys fees, according to the agreement sent by the LDS Church and signed by the Tanners on Nov. 30. The agreement still needs the approval of U.S. District Judge Tena Campbell, a move that both sides expect soon.
“We did not violate any copyright law,” Sandra Tanner said. “We have agreed to put this matter behind us. Our resources are better spent for their intended purpose: to examine the claims of the LDS Church and contrast those teachings with Christianity.”
Jerald Tanner said they entered into the agreement “only to end unnecessary, prolonged and expensive litigation and not because we did anything wrong.”
Dale Bills, an LDS spokesman, declined comment to Baptist Press, but told The Salt Lake Tribune that the church remained firm “in its position — as recognized by the federal court — that the Tanners illegally published church copyrighted materials.”
Bills acknowledged that a settlement was at hand. Brian Barnard, a Salt Lake attorney representing the Tanners, said the settlement was finalized when the Tanners signed it Nov. 30.
“They made a proposal and the Tanners signed it. That’s it,” Barnard said.
The legal battle between the Tanners and the LDS began in October 1999 when the Mormon Church, through its Intellectual Reserves, Inc., subsidiary that holds the rights to its intellectual property, sued the Tanners, alleging copyright infringement.
Campbell subsequently issued a temporary restraining order, a ruling that required the Tanners to remove the pages from their Internet site. However, the Tanners later posted an e-mail message from a reader containing Internet addresses where the entire handbook could be viewed. That prompted the church to return to court, asking Campbell to order the Tanners to remove the addresses, or “links,” alleging they were encouraging others to view and make illegal copies of the handbook pages. Campbell issued a preliminary injunction against the Tanners posting the links and ordered them removed.
Campbell’s ruling, which the Tanners were appealing to the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver, set off an explosive chain reaction throughout cyberspace. Supporters of free speech and cyber groups, including the San Francisco-based Electronic Frontier Foundation, decried the ruling as threatening the free exchange of ideas and information on the global Internet. Electronic Frontier, a nonprofit group that studies cyberspace freedom of expression issues, pledged to get involved in the case if Campbell’s restraining order and preliminary injunction were not lifted.
“Judge Campbell’s decision we think was a mistake and could have a broad influence on the Internet, but the Tanners’ goal was not to make Internet law, but to continue their ministry,” Barnard said. “However, we wanted to end this litigation especially as it goes into uncharted Internet law. Settlement of the case includes a withdrawal of the court’s opinion as to the posting of Internet addresses that may contain copyright material. That opinion which affected the rights of people who use the Internet had to be removed either by an appeal or by this agreement.”
Barnard said Campbell’s ruling could have had a devastating effect on the Internet. “So we wanted to get it off the books,” he said, noting that Campbell’s decision has already been cited in the copyright lawsuit involving an Internet-based music company, Napster.
Barnard said the Tanners did not violate copyright law and criticized the Mormon Church for specifically targeting the couple.
“The New York Times put up URLs [Internet addresses] with links to the same information as my clients put up,” Barnard said. “The Salt Lake Tribune published the same URLs and neither The Tribune nor The New York Times is being sued. So it appears this litigation is based more on a theological dispute.”
The handbook can still be found by typing it into Internet search engines.
Sandra Tanner, who was featured in a Southern Baptist video explaining Mormon beliefs issued prior to the 1998 Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting in Salt Lake City, said Utah Lighthouse Ministry’s website was established to let people know that “the Mormon religion is false, that Joseph Smith is a false prophet and that they are in danger of jeopardizing their eternal welfare.”
“Unlike other churches, the Mormon Church does not make their operating manual available to people,” Tanner said. “We provided the quotes from the Church Handbook due to the many inquiries we have received from people seeking information on how to terminate their LDS church membership. People need to be informed that they do not have to be excommunicated, that they can write a letter to their bishop and resign.”
The Tanners were excommunicated by the LDS Church in the 1960s when they asked to be removed from church rolls.
“The Mormon Church never drops you from the rolls no matter how inactive you have been. I have people writing us all the time, asking what they have to do to get [the LDS] off their backs.”
The LDS was criticized last year after some people claimed they received harassing phone calls from the church for writing letters requesting they be removed from church rolls.
Tanner said there has been a significant increase in traffic at the Utah Lighthouse website since the legal wrangling began.
“For the first time people realized there was a handbook,” she said. “Suppressing something creates more interest. I don’t understand why the church didn’t have an open policy to begin with.”
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