WWE Hall of Famer Booker T is scheduled to go to court for the civil lawsuit that he filed in February 2019 against video game producer Activision Publishing, Inc., Activision Blizzard, Inc., and Major League Gaming Corp., according to a report from Mike Johnson of PWInsider.com.
The report notes that in the lawsuit, Booker T alleges that the look of the character David ‘Prophet’ Wilkes in Call Of Duty: Black Ops 4 was based on the comic book version of Booker T’s former professional wrestling persona G.I. Bro, a character used by Booker T when he was breaking into the business in Texas in the early 1990’s and brought back for a short period of time in WCW in the late 1990’s. The report adds that in the lawsuit filed before the United States District Court for Eastern Division of Texas, it is alleged that Activision and the other defendants based Prophet on the comic book version of the G.I. Bro character, which had two books released about it in 2015 and noted that Booker T created and owns the copyrights to character, but that Activision began utilizing Booker T’s G.I. Bro image in Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, which went on sale in late 2018.
The report states that in the nine-page filing, Booker T noted this is an action for copyright infringement as Booker T created two comic books based on his character G.I. Bro, a special operations action hero and that Defendants published a series of multiplayer, first-person shooter games under the general title Call of Duty, noting that in 2018, Defendants released Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, a prequel to the prior videogame Call of Duty: Black Ops III and that in Call of Duty: Black Ops III, one of the specialist characters was David ‘Prophet’ Wiles, who had replaced 90% of his body with cybernetics to enhance his fighting ability and that for the prequel Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, Defendants chose to depict ‘Prophet’ as he was before he remade himself and could have drawn him any way that they wanted, but chose to steal Booker T’s G.I. Bro character. Booker T alleges that the defendants have infringed on his character without permission, that he was never contacted to give permission and that by continuing to do so, the defendants continue to infringe upon his copyrights by creating a copy of Booker T’s character, have created a derivative work through their character Prophet and have distributed, or caused to be distributed, by sale or otherwise, copies or derivatives of the G.I. Bro Works by distributing the game Call of Duty: Black Ops 4.
The lawsuit claims that the video game is thought to have made over $1 Billion since its release. Booker T has requested a jury trial and to be awarded whatever relief is determined by the court, with jury selection to begin on April 19th at 9am before District Judge Robert W. Schroeder III.