Da Vinci rights row author dies

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Richard Leigh, one of two writers who unsuccessfully sued for plagiarism the publishers of the global best-seller the Da Vinci Code, has died aged 64.

US-born Leigh, who had lived in Britain for many years, had been suffering from a heart condition.

Leigh, along with Michael Baigent, claimed themes from their work The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail were plagiarised by author Dan Brown.

They lost their lengthy, high-profile case in 2006 and again later at appeal.

The High Court in London ruled in April 2006 that US writer Brown had not copied the work of the two authors. The Court of Appeal in London upheld that ruling in March 2007.

Leigh and Baigent were told to pay 85% of publisher Random House's costs of almost £1.3m.

After the verdict Leigh said: ""We lost on the letter of the law. I think we won on the spirit of the law, to that extent we feel vindicated."

Dan Brown said authors should be free to draw from historical sources

Following the case's dismissal in 2006, Brown said the verdict showed that Baigent and Leigh's claim was "utterly without merit".

The outcome cleared the way for a film based on The Da Vinci Code, starring Tom Hanks and Audrey Tautou, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival last year.

Baigent and Leigh's book, which was published in 1982, has sold some two million copies around the world, and was a best-seller when it was first released.

Leigh was born in New Jersey in 1943 to a British father and Austrian mother. He worked as a university lecturer in the US and Canada, before settling in he UK.

He and Baigent also co-authored The Dead Sea Scrolls Deception, The Messianic Legacy, The Temple and the Lodge, Secret Germany: Claus von Stauffenberg and the Mystical Crusade against Hitler, The Elixir and The Stone, and The Inquisition.

He also wrote fiction, Erceldoune and other Stories, and the semi-autobiographical Grey Magic.