On May 17, 1996, Judge Magnuson of the District of Minnesotat
dismissed the attempt of Oasis Publishing Company to challenge the
pagination copyright of West Publishing Company and held that
notwithstanding Feist, West v. Mead was still good law in the
District of Minnesota. The opinion and other related documents have
been posted on HyperLaw's Web site, www.hyperlaw.com.
Unfortunately, the case is clouded because West had previously
claimed that Oasis was seeking an advisory opinion and sought to have
the Oasis challenge dismissed on constitutional jurisdiction grounds,
but West dropped this position once it got the case transferred to
Minnesota. Although Oasis and West stipulated to jurisdiction, they
did not stipulate to underlying facts that would suggest that Oasis's
challenge withstood case or controversy requirements. So-called West
Rules of Justiciabilty are discussed in Memorandum of Law filed this
week by Matthew Bender and Com. in another case pedning in the
Southern District of New York.
In another constitutional deviation, the Minnesota Court has ignored
constitutional first amendment requirements of an open and public
trial, seemingly giving benign neglect to another stipulation of the
parties that sealed relevant documents used in the motion for summary
judgment. This is the type of secrecy that occurs when district
court judges are asleep at the wheel as the 6th Circuit recently
criticized heavily in the Business Week -- Bankers Trust/Proctor &
Gamble situation. Among the sealed documents is the deposition of
Dorothy Beresgaard, the West witness that provide the affidavit
asserting creativity etc., and Robert Berring, expert witness for
West.
HyperLaw has collected approximately 750 pages of documents in the
Oasis case. If anyone is interested in purchasing a copy of the
entire set (no partial sets), please contact me.
Alan
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:: Alan D. Sugarman Federal Appeals on Disc tm CD-ROM ::
:: President Opinions of US Courts of Appeals ::
:: 1993 to Date - All Circuits ::
:: HyperLaw, Inc. Registered Trademark ::
:: P.O. Box 1176 DO NOT SHORT CIRCUIT YOUR CLIENTS ::
:: New York, NY 10023 ::
:: sugarman@hyperlaw.com 212-787-2812 212-496-4138(fax) ::
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