Harry Potter creator JK Rowling, one of the world's richest authors, is facing a multi-million -pound lawsuit for alleged plagiarism, a media report said.
According to leading newspaper 'The Times', Rowling has been accused of stealing ideas for a book from her famous 'Harry Potter' series from the British author of a children's book -- the late Adrian Jacobs.
The estate of the late British author has alleged in the lawsuit that Rowling replicated a substantial part of Jacob's 1987 book 'The Adventures of Willy the Wizard: No1 in Livid Land' in her 'Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire'.
The lawsuit, moved in a London court last June, claims that Jacobs used concepts and themes such as wizard prisons, wizard hospitals and wizard colleges years before Rowling did.
Max Markson, who is representing Paul Allen, the Australian-based trustee of Jacobs' estate, said Rowling was added to the lawsuit as a defendant after his client learned that the statute of limitations to sue her had not run out.
"I estimate it's a billion-dollar case. When you think of all the money that's involved, I would say $1 billion is a conservative estimate," Markson was quoted as saying.
The theme of 'Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire' was identical to the theme of 'Willy the Wizard', he said. "If your child read 'Willy the Wizard' he would say to you 'that's just like Goblet of Fire'."
'Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire' was the fourth of seven of the stratospherically successful books about the boy wizard which have become a global brand worth an estimated seven billion pounds.
Rowling is yet to comment on the lawsuit.