The case of the Church vs the Andean Explorers Foundation is over. The Church has been in a legal entanglement with the Andean Explorers Foundation for more than two years. After Andean separated itself from the Church, significant material was removed from Church premises, and Andean claimed ownership over it. This created a major dispute relating to intellectual and other property created by members of the Church, including the late Gene Savoy Sr., as well as precious property in the Church’s possession and collected over a period of decades. This constituted a serious breach of trust and was something that the Church could not allow.
We received the final order and stipulation for the case from Judge David A. Hardy on May 24, 2019, which reads, in part:
The parties stipulate that the “Cosolargy Works” [all intellectual and other property held by Andean] … are the sole and exclusive property of The Head Overseer (Bishop) of the International Community of Christ, Church of the Second Advent, and His Successor, a Nevada Corporation Sole, free and clear of any and all claims of right of ownership or right therein by Andean Explorers Foundation and Ocean Sailing Club, a Nevada Non-Profit Corporation, save and except as same may be licensed by The Head Overseer (Bishop) of the International Community of Christ, Church of the Second Advent, and His Successor, a Nevada Corporation Sole, to Andean Explorers Foundation and Ocean Sailing Club, a Nevada Non-Profit Corporation, in accordance with the parties’ settlement agreement.
Bishop Gene Savoy Jr. reported, “The case ultimately went in our favor, in as much as we have retrieved all of the property that was taken. The Church owns all of that property, and we are now in the licensing process with Andean to determine which items will be licensed and which will not be licensed. So that is still ongoing. We have a mediator, so if there are any disputes that arise in the future, we go to the mediator. We do not go to the judge. At the end of the day, we have recovered everything. Whatever it is, the Church has recovered all of it – everything that exists,” Bishop Savoy said.
The history of the case began officially in January 2017, when Bishop Savoy, Jr. notified the Andean board of directors that the work, scope and mission of Andean was part of the Church, as envisioned by its founder, the lat Gene Savoy, Sr., and that their departure from that work, scope and mission, needed to stop. Andean’s response to that letter was unacceptable, and the present lawsuit commenced.
Eventually, a settlement agreement was reached and drawn up in June, 2018, which allowed Andean to license certain items for their use. But disputes and conflicts arose over the items to be licensed. “There were Church and Jamilian University related items that the Andean claimed licensing rights over, and the Church disputed those claims, so, essentially, the case should have been concluded almost a year ago, but it dragged out for another year over all of the licensing procedures, which, interesting enough, we are still going through. So now both parties have agreed to an amendment to the original settlement to clarify the process,” Bishop Savoy explained.
The amendment deals with a new process for Andean to submit its licensing requests through the mediator. Because both parties have agreed to the use of a mediator to handle disputes, the case has now been moved out of court and all the details of licensing are no longer a problem that needs to be resolved by the court.
“The Church has made its notations of Andean’s request to indicate what we can license and what we won’t license, what we can’t license, what we will license but we are not responsible for how they use it, for instance, the music,” Bishop Savoy said. It is the Church’s position that Andean’s request to license past musical recordings and performance videos in almost all cases would violate copyright ownership and/or music performing rights as protected by copyright law and the music performing right organizations of ASCAP and BMI. The same concerns pertain to certain films and videos held by the Church, which has been granted limited usage by the likes of CBS, ABC, BBC, and others.
“Needless to say, it cost the Church quite a bit of money in legal fees to recover the entirety of the property, but that is what has finally transpired. As of May, this lawsuit has been dismissed by the court in our favor. . . The long and short of it is that we recovered all of our property, intellectual and other,” Bishop Savoy said.
“Some members of The Community have questioned the wisdom of pursing this course of action,” he continued. “However, I cannot stress enough the importance and significance of our explorations, discoveries and research in Peru. The information that was gathered, primarily by my late father is profound, to say the least. He spent decades of his life researching and uncovering civilizations that no longer exist that used the Sun for their spiritual benefit. The archaeological discoveries aside, which are also very significant, were not as important as the spiritual discoveries he made. This information is primarily what we sought to protect in order that these things would not be commercialized, secularized and put to profane use. And that is why we have created ‘Gene Savoy Xplorations’ as a branch of The Community, to preserve and protect this work and carry it forward into the future.
“The main thing is, I want to let everyone know that we were successful in what we set out to do. The importance of why we did it is, I think, the key. Why are we doing this? Why did we spend the money? A lot of people would say, ‘That’s ridiculous. It doesn’t make any sense. Who cares? Just let them have it.’ For some reason, we didn’t look at it that way. And the reason is that our action keeps the integrity of the work and allows us to do something with it in a new way, which I think is important.
“I think we already know all of the reasons that the explorations went far beyond archaeological work. That doesn’t mean that the archaeological work is unimportant. It is important. But the big picture is much more important than that. And I don’t really think that my father would have wanted his work to be divided – to be chopped up. I don’t know what he would have done. But the way that I was trained – the way that he taught me – was that if things are important, you fight for them. Otherwise everybody comes in, as he would say, raids you and steals your stuff, and then you have nothing.”
