CA1: First Circuit expounds on discovery rule

Warren Freedenfeld Associates v. Michael P. McTigue et al., 07-1602 & 07-1603 (6/20/08).  This comes down to a question of when a statute of limitations in copyright infringement cases begins to run.  The underlying facts revolve around a business dispute between a veterinarian and an architect. As the efforts to build an animal hospital went to the dogs, the architect registered the mark.  Then they thought they settled the dispute and agreed that “(the Gardner Animal Hospital) would [not] "use any of the work solely produced by WFA." The word "solely" was handwritten and inserted in the typewritten text. Both McTigue and Freedenfeld initialed that alteration.”  The vet found a new architect, and built the hospital.  This design won an award for “merit.” The first architect brought suit.  The District Court said that he had waited more than three years, because of the “overwhelming” evidence that a “reasonable” person would have know (or thought they knew) that some infringement was afoot.  The First reverses and explains that with regard to the discovery rule: (look below the fold)

 

... the duty to investigate is not always in the wind. Typically, inquiry notice must be triggered by some event or series of events that comes to the attention of the aggrieved party.... A searching examination of the complaint and the documents annexed thereto reveals no facts, prior to Freedenfeld's chance encounter with a trade publication in 2004, sufficient to mandate a conclusion that a reasonable person would have suspected that the copyrighted material had been used in an unauthorized manner. In the absence of some triggering event — some sign of storm clouds gathering on the horizon — WFA cannot be charged as a matter of law with inquiry notice.

It then explains how things can’t be read in isolation. 

Regarding counterclaims, the First agrees that summary judgment was properly granted when the “the district court concluded that McTigue could not demonstrate that he was even a joint author of any portion of the copyrighted work.”