Lawsuit alleges profits from new books should be directed solely to estate
By Heather Cobun
BridgeTower Media Newswires
BALTIMORE, MD — Tom Clancy’s widow has asked a judge to declare the author’s estate sole owner of his Jack Ryan character, thereby entitling it to all profits from posthumous book deals.
Ryan, who first appeared in Clancy’s “The Hunt for Red October” in 1984, was the author’s “most prized possession,” according to the complaint for declaratory judgement filed Friday in Baltimore City Circuit Court.
“Tom Clancy made Jack Ryan; and, in a sense, Jack Ryan made Tom Clancy,” the lawsuit states.
The character appeared in multiple books, including some written by other authors and published after his death in 2013.
The profits from those posthumous books and those involving other characters created by Clancy have been divided between the estate and companies owned by Clancy, his ex-wife and their adult children during his life. Clancy’s stake in those companies, Jack Ryan Enterprises Ltd., Jack Ryan Limited Partnership and Rubicon Inc., is now owned by his estate.
But Clancy’s widow, Alexandra, said the profit-sharing should have not occurred because the rights to the characters were owned solely by Clancy until his death and since then by his estate.
The lawsuit alleges J.W. Thompson Webb, the personal representative of the estate, has “failed repeatedly to defend the Estate’s unique interest in Tom Clancy’s characters” by signing agreements distributing profits from the new books between the estate and the companies.
“Mrs. Clancy filed this lawsuit to compel the personal representative of her husband’s estate to do his job: to claim for the estate rights to the literary character Jack Ryan created by Tom Clancy,” said Norman L. Smith, one of Alexandra Clancy’s lawyers.
Webb, a principal at Miles & Stockbridge PC in Baltimore, declined to comment.
Alexandra Clancy previously clashed with Webb over how taxes should be paid from his $86 million estate, with the Court of Appeals ultimately siding with her interpretation of the will last year.
“This is the second chapter in Mrs. Clancy’s struggles to compel Mr. Webb’s adherence to his fiduciary responsibilities as Personal Representative of the Estate,” the complaint states.
Ownership history
In the court filing, Alexandra Clancy points to a 1988 arbitration settlement between Tom Clancy and the publisher of “The Hunt for Red October” which expressly acknowledged that Clancy owned the characters from the book, including Ryan. The copyright for the book was later transferred from the publisher to Jack Ryan Enterprise Ltd. “in accordance with the terms of the agreements” between Clancy and the publisher with no mention of the rights to the character, the complaint states.
The settlement agreement in the author’s divorce from wife Wanda King in 1998 also specifically referred to Clancy’s rights to the characters created in works owned by the companies, the complaint states.
“Accordingly, unless Tom Clancy subsequently assigned his rights to the character Jack Ryan, he remained the exclusive owner of the character Jack Ryan until his death on October 1, 2013,” the lawsuit states.
The complaint also claims Jack Ryan Jr. and other characters from the universe were owned by Rubicon, which was owned by Tom Clancy and received all of the profits from those books. Profits from books featuring these characters are now also being distributed between the companies and the estate.
Alexandra Clancy is seeking declarations that the characters were owned by her husband when he died and ownership passed to the estate, making the estate entitled to revenue from post-death books. She is represented by Smith, Jeffrey E. Nusinov and Paul D. Raschke of Nusinov Smith LLP in Baltimore and Lansing R. Palmer, Erin M. Maddocks and Amanda Klopp of Akerman LLP in New York.
The case is Alexandra M. Clancy v. J.W. Thompson Webb, et al.
