A Texas judge has ordered "Fifty Shades of Grey" publisher Amanda Hayward to set aside $10 million from the book's proceeds as the legal case could now head to Australia.
State District Judge Susan McCoy has given a deadline of Sept. 25 for the money to be deposited in a court registry, according to news.com.au.
Jennifer Pedroza, Hayward's former business partner, has sued the Sydney publisher for defrauding her out of her share from the sale of rights of the book "Fifty Shades of Grey" and the other two sequels. The rights to the trilogy, written by EL James, were sold to Random House in 2012. In February, a U.S. court jury found that Hayward had committed fraud against Pedroza.
The final judgment in Texas is still pending, but Pedroza's lawyer, Mike Harris, said they will pursue legal actions in Australia over his client's claim on her outstanding share of royalty rights. "Fifty Shades of Grey" has earned an estimated amount of $41 million in book sales and film rights based on Forensic accountants' calculation, The Sydney Morning Herald reported. Pedroza's share is at 25 percent of that.
However, The Sydney Morning Herald said that according to Hayward's lawyers, she did not have the cash in surety. Hence, the judge ruled that properties could be applied, noting Hayward's home in a Sydney suburb as her most valuable asset.
Pedroza and Hayward used to work together in running the fan fiction site The Writer's Coffee Shop. The site published "Fifty Shades of Grey" in 2009 as an e-book and print-on-demand book. After it was sold to Random House, the first book was released in 2011, becoming an immediate hit. Today, over 125 million copies of the trilogy had been sold and earlier this year, a movie adaptation of the first volume was released starring Jamie Dornan and Dakota Johnson.
