When Somerset County resident Valencia McClatchey captured the fleeting moments of peace on a warm fall morning with her digital camera, she never thought that photograph, “End of Serenity,” would be the basis for a law suit against the Associated Press (AP) over copyright infringement.

On Sept.11, 2001 McClatchey was at home, glued to the television coverage of the morning’s tragic events when she was shaken from her seat by a loud boom. From her living room window she saw a large gray cloud of smoke rising over the horizon. She instinctively went to the door, grabbed her digital camera and captured the infamous image of the smoke rising into the blue cloudless sky over her neighbors’ red barn seconds after the crash of United Airlines Flight 93.

In the ensuing months McClatchey’s photograph gained so much notoriety that in January 2002 she obtained a copyright for her famous snapshot, which was supposed to allow her the rights to control its use. Eight months later, she would sue the AP, claiming that the large media organization infringed her copyrights, which the AP disputed.

According to Mass Media Law, a copyright protects a work like McClatchey’s photograph from being put on display, distributed or reproduced without consent. McClatchey said that she obtained the copyright because she did not want her photo to be misused in any way and she said firmly, “When I copyright the photo, I have the rights.”

On the first anniversary of the crash McClatchey was interviewed by AP reporter Charles Sheehan. AP photographer Gene Puskar visited McClatchey a short time later and took her photo to accompany Sheehan’s article.

McClatchey posed with her original photograph for Puskar. She said she believed the picture was of both her and her photograph.

McClatchey said that she also gave a copy of her photograph to Puskar as a gift. The copy contained her copyright management information. “They knew it was copyrighted,” McClatchey said.