Legal Fallout From Those "Masked Magician" Specials

I was browsing for more information about possible legal fallout from the broadcast of the "Masked Magician" specials on the Fox network in the late 1990s and found an article published in the Herald Sun (Melbourne), dated June 4, 2003, called Magic Cat Is Out of the Bag. Apparently twenty-one Brazilian magicians sued the Globo TV network, Brazil's biggest, for broadcasting the specials, because the conjurors lost income after audiences saw the secrets of the illusions (and presumably lost interest in going to magic shows). One magician, Paulo Roberto Brito Martins, said he lost more than $800,000 in income. The court ruled that the network should pay each magician damages in the amount of his (or her) lost income. I'd be curious to know more about the legal basis for the ruling, and to get a copy of the opinion. Anybody out there have access to Brazilian case law? The case comes out of Rio Grande do Sul; the judge is Eduardo Kothe Werlang.

Comments

[Geovani]

I've read the STJ (Superior Court of Justice) decided that, after all, Globo doesn't have to pay anything for the magicians who sued them - even after being "condemned" in 2003, or something like that:

http://www.stj.gov.br/portal_stj/publicacao/engine.wsp?tmp.area=448&tmp.texto=89433

The show was known as "Mister M" here in Brazil, and the text in the link, in brazilian portuguese, is dated 2008-10-01. There's another one, dated 2009-03-09, that says the decision has been maintained (sorry I don't know how to translate accurately the juridical terms into English for more details.)