Legal Question in Technology Law in Washington

Re: Who owns my domain & website?

Let's assume that the league owns a car, and they allow you to wash it every week, without written contract. You even put ads in the paper saying "look at this great car!" and hang one of those little pine smellum things from the rear view...Do you then own the car? The analogy isn't perfect, but my point is that you don't have any rights to exploit the intellectual property of the league without their permission. They didn't give you the right to own the league name, likenesses of people in the league or anything else that you could not have compiled from the newspaper. If the members paid for the maintenance, then anything above that compensated you for your time and efforts. If you volunteered to do it, that's free to them, sort of like a fan website. If an accounting is done, they probably could convince a judge that they own the domain and hosting, and that that's what the various $100 fees paid for, plus a stipend for your time and effort.

HOWEVER, you're not totally out of luck here. Any content that you created independently is presumably owned by you since I saw nothing of your granting them rights to use it. An accounting should be done to clarify where their money was spent (their right) and how much compensation you have received for your time (your right). I don't think you have the right to monkey around with the site registrations, --if you end up in court, who will look bad as a result? You. Given that hosting AND domain registration is dirt cheap now, I don't think the volunteer nature of your work will convince anyone that you're the victim here. It's just a parting of the ways, which, if you manage it well, can result in a continued relationship, or even a better deal than before.