Amendment and discovery is permitted in copyright case
Andrew Paul Leonard v. Stemtech Health Sciences, Inc. and John Does 1-100, Civil Action No.08-67-JJF, July 16, 2010.
Farnan, J. Plaintiff’s motion to compel discovery and motion for leave to file an amended complaint are granted. The court declines to award costs of bringing the motion.
This dispute relates to the alleged unlicensed use of plaintiff’s copyrighted biological images. The parties have a licensing agreement, but plaintiff claims the use made exceeds the scope of that agreement. Plaintiff seeks responses to interrogatories. Defendant has agreed to supplement one, and the court orders responses to all but one of the remaining interrogatories. The request to “describe in detail how you engage your Independent Distributors and identify all documents relating to your Independent Distributors was found to be overly broad and unduly burdensome. The court further grants the motion to take a 30(b)(6) deposition of defendant. Fees in connection with this motion are not warranted. Plaintiff’s motion to amend the complaint to add claims of contributory copyright infringement and vicarious copyright infringement, and to amend to include actual or statutory damages and fees and costs is granted over defendant’s objection that the amendment adds 37 new claims and are prejudicial, untimely, made in bad faith, and futile. The amendment removes date references to when the infringing activity began so as to avoid limits of relief available for infringement commenced before the copyright was registered. That issue is preserved for further development during discovery.
