Jayme Gordon

"I would never set out to write a story that would put me in a situation like this."

- Jayme Gordon to a judge

Jayme Gordon is a US cartoonist and fraudster who forged a claim to own the copyright of Kung Fu Panda in a multimillion dollar lawsuit.

Gordon registered vast swathes of work with the US Copyright Office around the millennium, then modified some in 2008 after seeing a Kung Fu Panda trailer and registered his new versions as Kung Fu Panda Power. In 2011 he sued film franchise creator DreamWorks in US federal court, filing sketches very similar to the animated movie's characters. He proposed a $12 million settlement, but DreamWorks rejected this and spent two years defending the action at a cost to them of $3 million.

His scheme collapsed when DreamWorks realised his supposedly original sketches from the early 90s were in fact traced and slightly modified from a Disney coloring book from 1996. Evidence was also adduced in 2012 that Gordon used a computer programme called Permanent Eraser to delete material over three days in April that year. Gordon withdrew his claim.

The Cybercrime Unit of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Boston got involved, as Gordon is from Randolph, Massachusetts. He was indicted in 2015. He faced four counts of wire fraud alleging four emails sent by lawyers on his behalf, including the proposed settlement, were communications sent across state lines to further hsi fraudulent plans. He also faced three counts of perjury, and was convicted of all charges by a federal jury in November 2016. Gordon had himself been seeking a jury trial to perpetrate his fraud.

In May 2017, at the age of 51, Gordon's story was completed as he was sentenced to two years in prison. Gordon wept when addressing the judge but continued denying his guilt, while his lawyer noted a history of poor mental health in mitigation.