A High Court judge in London on Tuesday awarded Ed Sheeran and his co-songwriters more than £900,000 in legal costs after winning a copyright trial over his hit ‘Shape of You’.
The 31-year-old Sheeran was taken to court and accused of copying a phrase from the British grime track ‘Oh Why’ when writing the worldwide smash. But judge Antony Zacaroli ruled in April this year after an 11-day trial that the star ‘neither deliberately nor subconsciously’ plagiarised the hook.
On Wednesday, the judge said the artists who brought the claim — Sami Chokri and Ross O’Donoghue — should pay legal costs.
He ordered an interim payment of £916,200 ($1.1 million).
Sheeran welcomed the initial ruling but said that ‘baseless’ copyright claims were ‘damaging the songwriting industry’.