Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-cand-3_15-cv-04556/USCOURTS-cand-3_15-cv-04556-4/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 830
Nature of Suit: Patent
Cause of Action: 35:145 Patent Infringement

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United States District Court

Northern District of California

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

JEREMIAH W. BALIK,

Plaintiff,

v.

TOY TALK, INC., et al.,

Defendants.

Case No. 15-cv-04556-JST 

ORDER GRANTING WITH 

PREJUDICE MOTION TO DISMISS

AND DENYING MOTIONS TO 

COMPEL

Re: ECF No. 74, 68, 72.

Before the Court is Defendants’ Joint Motion to Dismiss Plaintiff’s Third Amended 

Complaint. ECF No. 74. The motion is granted, and because further amendment would be futile, 

the case shall be dismissed with prejudice. Accordingly, Plaintiffs’ two pending motions to 

compel discovery are denied as moot. ECF Nos. 68, 72.1 The Court also orders the subpoenas 

issued by Plaintiff to be vacated.

I. BACKGROUND

Plaintiff Jeremiah Balik, appearing pro se, brings this case against Defendants Toy Talk, 

Inc. and Mattel, Inc. See ECF No. 1. His case focuses on his allegations that he invented the 

concept of “embedding mini Bluetooth speakers (E.G. Sound ID to manufacture) inside plush, 

action-figures, dolls, etc.” See ECF No. 62 at 2. The operative Third Amended Complaint was 

filed on April 22, 2016. ECF No. 67 (“TAC”). The Defendants jointly filed a motion to dismiss 

Plaintiff’s complaint in its entirety. ECF No. 74. The Court previously granted a motion to 

dismiss Plaintiff’s Second Amended Complaint, in which he alleged claims of conversion and 

patent infringement. ECF No. 62. 

 

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Pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 78(b) and Civil Local Rule 7-1(b), the Court finds 

all of these matters suitable for disposition without oral argument. Defendants’ Motion to 

Continue, ECF No. 80, is denied as moot.

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Plaintiff now alleges two causes of action: conversion and copyright infringement. TAC 

¶¶ 6-7. He alleges that he “had right to possession of invention for embedding mini speakers and 

connecting them to smart devices such as computers and smart phones.”2 Id. ¶ 8. He alleges that 

he sent Defendants “hundreds of emails over a five year period[,] pertaining to published patent 

application #12/659,756 invention and expression of ideas via PowerPoint docs per Copyright #1-

2971746331.” Id. ¶ 9. He alleges that he also submitted or discussed his idea with various people 

at agencies, production companies, and other groups in the entertainment and toy industries. Id. ¶¶ 

9, 14, 15, 21. “With Plaintiff’s application driven toy idea, not only would a toy company 

generate revenue from a one off toy purchase,” but it “could generate top-line revenue from the 

purchase of audio downloadable content.” Id. ¶ 9. Plaintiff alleges that “Hello Barbie,” one of 

Defendants’ products, is “solely based on Plaintiff’s invention,” ECF No. 9, and that Defendants

also “ripped . . . off” a “Green Lantern” toy idea from him, ECF No. 25. 

Though Plaintiff now longer appears to raise a patent infringement claim, he also offers 

allegations regarding his patent application. Id. ¶¶ 10-18. Finally, Plaintiff offers several 

allegations that Chicago Mayor Rahm Emmanuel and Congressman Fred Upton have “derail[ed]” 

Plaintiff’s efforts to obtain a patent, licensing agreements, or job opportunities, and that they did 

so in order to interfere with his relationship with his girlfriend. Id. ¶¶ 20, 22, 24.

Defendants filed their joint Motion to Dismiss on May 5, 2016. ECF No. 74. The motion 

was opposed, ECF No. 77, and the Defendants filed a reply, ECF No. 79. Prior to this motion, 

Plaintiff filed two Motions to Compel Discovery, which appear to request unspecified discovery 

from a third party named Mike Jones. ECF Nos. 68, 72. These motions were opposed, ECF No. 

75, and no reply was filed. Finally, the Court notes that Plaintiff appears to have issued three 

subpoenas through the Court to third parties. ECF Nos. 71, 73.

II. LEGAL STANDARD

A complaint must contain “a short and plain statement of the claim showing that the 

 

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For the purposes of deciding this motion, the Court accepts as true the following allegations from 

Plaintiff’s complaint. Moyo v. Gomez, 40 F.3d 982, 984 (9th Cir. 1994).

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pleader is entitled to relief,” in order to “give the defendant fair notice of what the . . . claim is and 

the ground upon which it rests.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2); Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 

544, 555 (2007). “To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient factual 

matter, accepted as true, to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 

556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (internal quotation marks omitted). “A claim has facial plausibility when 

the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the 

defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged.” Id. “Dismissal under Rule 12(b)(6) is appropriate 

only where the complaint lacks a cognizable legal theory or sufficient facts to support a cognizable 

legal theory.” Mendiondo v. Centinela Hosp. Med. Ctr., 521 F.3d 1097, 1104 (9th Cir. 2008). The 

Court must “accept all factual allegations in the complaint as true and construe the pleadings in the 

light most favorable to the nonmoving party.” Knievel v. ESPN, 393 F.3d 1068, 1072 (9th Cir. 

2005).

“A document filed pro se is to be liberally construed and a pro se complaint, however 

inartfully pleaded, must be held to less stringent standards than formal pleadings drafted by 

lawyers.” Erickson v. Pardus, 551 U.S. 89, 94 (2007) (internal quotation marks and citations 

omitted).

III. DISCUSSION

Defendants argue that both of Plaintiffs’ causes of action should be dismissed for failure to 

plead a plausible claim. The Court will grant Defendants’ motion.

A. Conversion

In its prior order, the Court dismissed Plaintiffs’ claim for conversion because he failed to 

identify some kind of property right. See ECF No. 62 at 3-4; see also Language Line Servs., Inc. 

v. Language Servs. Assocs., Inc., 944 F. Supp. 2d 775, 780 (N.D. Cal. 2013) (“In order to state a 

claim for conversion, the plaintiff must identify some property in which he had property rights 

with which the defendant could, and did, interfere.” (emphasis removed)). Defendants argue that 

Plaintiff has once again failed to allege such a property right. ECF No. 74 at 11. The Court 

agrees. The gravamen of Plaintiff’s claim appears to be unchanged – he alleges that Defendants 

stole or copied his idea to embed speakers inside toys or dolls. But, as the Court explained in its 

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prior order, a plausible conversion claim cannot be based on an “idea for toy design.” ECF No. 74 

at 4 (citing to Dielsi v. Falk, 916 F. Supp. 985, 992 (C.D. Cal. 1996)). Though Plaintiff refers 

generally in his complaint to the concept of intangible property such as corporate stocks or bonds, 

TAC ¶ 6, he provides no allegations suggesting that he in fact owns any kind of property interest 

that was subsequently obtained by Defendants. To the extent Plaintiff wishes to base his 

conversion claim on allegations of either copyright or patent interests, this is also implausible. 

The Court previously noted that Plaintiff has failed to allege a valid patent claim, see ECF No. 74, 

and concludes below that Plaintiff has failed to plead a claim for copyright infringement.

Accordingly, the Motion to Dismiss Plaintiff’s cause of action for conversion is granted.

B. Copyright Infringement

Defendants contend that Plaintiff’s copyright infringement claim is implausible because he 

has failed to allege a valid copyright. ECF No. 74 at 13. They note that Plaintiff has failed to 

register his copyright with the Copyright Office, and further that he appears to be alleging a 

copyright in an underlying idea for toy design, which is expressly prohibited by the Copyright Act. 

Id. at 14; see also 17 U.S.C. § 102(b); Harper & Row Publishers, Inc. v. Nation Enterprises, 471 

U.S. 539, 547 (1985) (“[N]o author may copyright facts or ideas.”).

Plaintiff does not appear to contest that he is seeking copyright protection for an idea rather 

than a specific work of original authorship. See, e.g. ECF No. 77 at 2. (“Plaintiff is the original 

author, of the idea to embed mini Bluetooth speakers inside of toys.”). Instead, Plaintiff seems to 

argue in his opposition that he has sufficiently demonstrated the originality of his idea, and cites to 

Satava v. Lowry, 323 F.3d 805 (9th Cir. 2003), and Aliotti v. R. Dakin & Co., 831 F.2d 898 (9th 

Cir. 1987). See id. This argument is not relevant to Defendants’ contention that Plaintiff cannot 

obtain copyright protection for an idea rather than a work, and in any event, Defendants 

persuasively argue that this argument is not true in light of Plaintiff’s allegations that toymakers 

had already been considering the same concept. ECF No. 79 at 3. Finally, although Plaintiff does 

allege that he expressed his ideas “via PowerPoint docs,” TAC ¶ 9, he has not alleged any 

infringement of text, images, or other expressive content contained in those PowerPoint 

documents.

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Accordingly, the Court concludes Plaintiff has not plausibly alleged a claim for copyright 

infringement, and grants Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss in regards to that claim.

C. Leave to Amend

Though leave to amend should be freely given when justice so requires, Fed. R. Civ. P. 

15(a), a motion to amend should be denied if it appears that amendment would be futile. Miller v. 

Rykoff-Sexton, Inc., 845 F.2d 209, 214 (9th Cir. 1988).

Here, Plaintiff has amended his complaint three times and has twice failed to withstand a 

motion to dismiss. More importantly, it is unclear how Plaintiff could amend his pleadings to 

bring a plausible claim. The TAC does not offer additional factual allegations to buttress either of 

Plaintiff’s claims. Rather, it appears that Plaintiff has simply attempted to apply a different legal 

theory – copyright infringement rather than patent infringement – to the same allegations 

regarding the same products by Defendants and the same idea he conceived. Given that Plaintiff 

has so far been unable to successfully raise a legal claim based on these facts, it does not appear to 

the Court that additional leave to amend would be fruitful.

Accordingly, Defendant’s Motion to Dismiss is granted with prejudice as to all claims.

D. Pending Matters

In light of the Court’s conclusion, Plaintiff’s two Motions to Compel Discovery are denied 

as moot. Further, the subpoenas issued by Plaintiff to Mike Jones, ECF No. 71, Lori Tabb, and 

Commander Tim Higgins, ECF No. 73, are hereby vacated.

CONCLUSION

Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss is granted with prejudice. Plaintiffs’ Motions to Compel 

Discovery are denied as moot and all subpoenas issued by Plaintiff are vacated. The Clerk shall 

close the file. A copy of this order shall be mailed to the parties identified in Plaintiff’s 

subpoenas. See ECF Nos. 71, 73.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

Dated: June 6, 2016

______________________________________

JON S. TIGAR

United States District Judge

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