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Shaw v. Lindheim
United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
919 F.2d 1353 (1990)
- Written by Jack Newell, JD
Facts
Lou Shaw (plaintiff) wrote a script for a movie called The Equalizer. Richard Lindheim (defendant) wrote a script for a show also called The Equalizer. Shaw sued for copyright infringement in federal district court, claiming that the two works were substantially similar, meaning that Lindheim had infringed Shaw’s copyright. Lindheim filed a motion for summary judgment. The court granted the judgment, finding that the two works were similar under the extrinsic-similarity test but were not substantially similar under the intrinsic-similarity test. Shaw appealed to the Ninth Circuit.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Alarcon, J.)
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