Court Dismisses in Part Copyright Infringement Claim Over Sampled Music

In a September 10, 2013 ruling, Judge Alison J. Nathan granted in part defendants' motion to dismiss plaintiff TufAmerica, Inc.'s copyright infringement action.  TufAmerica, which is "the putative exclusive administrator and copyright licensee of a number of copyrights to the compositions and sound recordings of the musical group Trouble Funk," sued the individual members of the Beastie Boys and others, alleging that the group "unlawfully sampled a number of Trouble Funk's songs on the Beastie Boys' hit albums Licensed to Ill and Paul's Boutique."  TufAmerica's amended complaint asserted copyright infringment claims for six acts of unlawful sampling in Beastie Boys songs, and in particular that the samples "infringed both the musical composition and the sound recording of the sampled Trouble Funk songs." 

In analyzing whether the accused songs were substantially similar to the sampled songs for copyright infringement purposes, Judge Nathan applied the "fragmented literal similarity" test under which the Court examines whether there is "'localized' rather than 'global' similarity between the two pieces."  Applying this test, the Court noted that "'the question of substantial similarity is determined by an analysis of "whether the copying goes to trivial or substantial elements' of the original work.'"  Further, Judge Nathan wrote that the "real question" at the motion to dismiss "stage -- more so than the question of how to label the relevant test -- is whether (as to each sample) Plaintiff has plausibly alleged that the sample is quantitatively and qualitatively important to the original work such that the fragment similarity becomes sufficiently substantial for the use to become an infringement."

Court Applies Injury Rule, Rather than Discovery Rule, to Accrual of Copyright Infringement Claim

In an August 21, 2013 ruling, Judge Loretta A. Preska granted in part and denied in part defendants' motion for summary judgment on statute of limitations grounds in plaintiff Muench Photography, Inc.'s copyright infringement claims.  The parties agreed "that the principal question of law at issue with respect to whether certain of plaintiff's claims are time-barred is when a copyright infringement claim accrues under the three-year statute of limitations in the Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. § 507(b)."  The two accrual possibilities are when the injury occurred or when it was discovered.  According to the Court, prior Second Circuit law strongly indicated that the discovery rule applied, but the Supreme Court's decision in TRW v. Andrews, 534 U.S. 19 (2001) required reassessment that position.  Judge Preska surveyed the split of authority in the District on the issue, and joined "what is now the majority approach in this jurisdiction in adopting the injury rule for the purposes of evaluating whether copyright infringement claims are time barred."  Applying the injury rule, Judge Preska found some of Muench's claims time barred, and allowed others to proceed.