Jury: Katy Perry's 'Dark Horse' copied Christian rap song

A jury on Monday found that Katy Perry's 2013 hit "Dark Horse" improperly copied a 2009 Christian rap song, setting up arguments over how much singer and or defendants will owe. Monday's decision returned by a nine-member federal jury in a Los Angeles courtroom came five years after Marcus Gray and two co-authors first sued alleging "Dark Horse" stole from "Joyful ise," a song Gray released under st name Flame.

case w goes to a penalty phase, where jury will decide how much plaintiffs are owed for copyright infringement.

Gray's attorneys argued that beat and instrumental line featured through nearly half of "Dark Horse" are substantially similar to those of "Joyful ise." "Dark Horse," a hybrid of pop, trap and hip-hop sounds that was third single of Perry's 2013 album "Prism," spent four weeks atop Billboard Hot 100 in early 2014, and earned Perry a Grammy mination.

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Perry's attorneys argued that song sections in question represent kind of simple musical elements that if found to be subject to copyright would hurt music and all songwriters."y're trying to own basic building blocks of music, alphabet of music that should be available to everyone," Perry's lawyer Christine Lepera said during closing arguments Thursday.

Perry and song's co-authors, including her producer Dr. Luke, testified during seven-day trial that ne of m h heard song or heard of Gray before lawsuit, r did y listen to Christian music.

Gray's attorneys h only to demonstrate, however, that "Joyful ise" h wide dissemination and could have been heard by Perry and her co-authors, and provide as evidence that it h millions of plays on YouTube and Spotify, and that album it's included on was minated for a Grammy.

"y're trying to shove Mr. Gray into some gospel music alleyway that one ever visits," said plaintiffs' attorney Michael A. Kahn during closing arguments, when he also pointed out that Perry h begun her career as a Christian artist.

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Kahn and Gray declined to comment but smiled as y left courtroom after verdict. 34-year-old pop superstar and "American Idol" judge brought laughs to proceedings when she testified during its second day, and her lawyers were having technical troubles getting "Dark Horse" to play in courtroom.

"I could perform it live," Perry said. performance was necessary after audio issues were fixed. Jurors heard both songs played back-to-back in ir entirety at end of closing arguments this week.

Perry was t present for reing of verdict Monday afteron.