School District Asks Dismissal of Text Suit

The Capistrano Unified School District has asked a federal court in Santa Ana to dismiss a $300,000 lawsuit that accuses the district of copying elementary school workbooks without paying for them.

Educators Publishing Services Inc. of Cambridge, Mass., alleged in the suit filed Sept. 5 that the district had routinely bought single copies of workbooks over the last 10 years.

Educators sometimes order just one copy of a book to look at it and see whether they want to buy it, but Capistrano developed a pattern of buying one copy, said Robert Baker, a Los Angeles attorney for the publisher.

The company could not show that the district was illegally copying the workbooks for classroom use until an individual, who asked to remain anonymous, sent copies of workbooks distributed without the author’s and publisher’s names to the publisher, Baker said.

The suit alleges that the district infringed on six copyrights over the last year and seeks $300,000 in damages.

The district will ask that the suit be dismissed, based on copyright laws that allow some copyrighted materials to be reproduced in an educational setting, said attorney Richard Hamilton, whose Sacramento firm of Biddle & Hamilton is representing the district. A hearing is scheduled in U.S. District Court in Santa Ana on Nov. 13.

Hamilton said he will also argue that the district has immunity under the 11th Amendment to the Constitution, which prohibits a citizen from suing a state where he is not a resident. The district may be considered a state in this case, he said.

He will also argue that the statute of limitations has expired.

“If he (the publisher) has known about it for 10 years, it may be that his cause of action has run out,” Hamilton said.