Davis v. Pinterest, Inc.
- Haywood Gilliam
- 4:19-cv-07650
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 4
In Davis v. Pinterest, Judge Gilliam denied leave to add a Digital Millennium Copyright Act claim, while terminating an earlier amendment motion as moot.
Harold Davis and Pinterest, Inc.; the order governed Davis’s request to add a Digital Millennium Copyright Act claim and the further pleading of his copyright case.
What happened
Harold Davis, a digital artist and professional photographer, sued Pinterest, Inc., alleging direct and contributory copyright infringement based on images users post or save on Pinterest. Davis later sought to add a claim under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
The court had previously dismissed Davis’s contributory-infringement claim and allowed him to amend, but directed him not to add new claims or defendants. Davis first sought to add the Digital Millennium Copyright Act claim and bring a proposed class action; he later withdrew the class-action request and filed a revised motion seeking only to add the new claim.
Judge Haywood S. Gilliam, Jr. denied the revised motion because Davis had not reasonably explained why he failed to bring the claim earlier, and adding it would cause undue delay. The court terminated the earlier amendment motion as moot, while allowing Davis to file an amended complaint addressing the previously identified deficiencies by November 13, 2020.
The detailed version
- Davis v. Pinterest, Inc. · No. 4:19-cv-07650
- Haywood Gilliam
- Oct. 29, 2020
Background
Harold Davis alleged that he is a digital artist and professional photographer. Pinterest, Inc. operates an online platform where users create virtual boards by posting images. According to Davis, users may upload images captured by them or copied from elsewhere on the internet, and Pinterest does not screen those images for copyright notices or other signs of copyright ownership. Davis alleged that Pinterest therefore provides a mechanism for users to violate others’ intellectual-property rights.
Davis’s complaint asserted direct and contributory copyright infringement. Pinterest moved to dismiss the contributory-infringement claim. After Davis filed a first amended complaint, Pinterest again moved to dismiss that claim. On July 22, 2020, the court granted the motion to dismiss with leave to amend. The court directed Davis to file an amended complaint consistent with his obligations under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 11 and cautioned him not to add new defendants or claims.
Motions to Amend
Despite that direction, Davis moved for leave to add a claim under section 1202(b) of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and to bring the case on behalf of a proposed class. On the same day, his counsel filed another action against Pinterest in the same district that included allegations concerning Davis’s works and a Digital Millennium Copyright Act claim. The parties sought to have the cases treated as related. The court expressed concern that filing the expanded action and then seeking to relate the cases could circumvent its earlier order barring additional claims or defendants.
After meeting and conferring, Davis withdrew his request to bring this case as a proposed class action. He filed an amended motion seeking only to add the Digital Millennium Copyright Act claim.
Court’s Analysis
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(a)(2) generally provides that a court should freely allow an amended pleading when justice requires. But a court may deny leave based on factors including bad faith, undue delay, prejudice, whether the amendment would be futile, and whether the party has already amended the pleading.
Davis argued that the proposed claim was viable and that Pinterest would not be prejudiced because the case schedule had not yet been set. The court rejected that argument. Although Davis referred to newly developed facts, he did not identify any such facts. More importantly, he did not provide a reasonable explanation for failing to assert the Digital Millennium Copyright Act claim in either his initial complaint or his first amended complaint.
The court found that Davis had ample opportunity to assert the claim and that adding it at that stage would cause undue delay. The case had been pending for almost a year, and the parties had already engaged in two rounds of motions concerning the pleadings. The court also noted that adding the claim would likely lead to another motion to dismiss.
Disposition
The court denied Davis’s amended motion to amend the complaint, docket number
- It terminated as moot Davis’s prior motion to amend, docket number
- The court stated that Davis could file an amended complaint addressing the deficiencies identified in the earlier order, and consistent with the October 29 order, by November 13,
- The court also found that this case was not related to the other Pinterest action and scheduled a telephonic case-management conference for November 24, 2020.
The order addressed whether Davis could change his pleading; it did not decide the merits of the proposed Digital Millennium Copyright Act claim or the underlying copyright claims.
Read the full 4-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.