Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca10-94-01167/USCOURTS-ca10-94-01167-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Crystal Cartier
Appellant
Epic Records, Inc.
Appellee
Michael Jackson
Appellee
MJJ Productions, Inc.
Appellee
Sony Music Entertainment, Inc.
Appellee

Document Text:

PUBLISH 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

TENTH CIRCUIT 

CRYSTAL CARTIER, 

Plaintiff-Appellant, 

FILED 

United States Court of Appeals Tenth Circuit 

JUL 1 0 1995 

PATRICK FISHER 

Clerk 

v. No. 94-1167 

MICHAEL JACKSON; MJJ PRODUCTIONS, INC.; 

SONY MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT, INC. ; and 

EPIC RECORDS, INC., 

Defendants-Appellees. 

ON APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLORADO 

(D.C. No. 92-N-1115) 

Davide C. Migliaccio (Burton I. Wherry and Edward P. Carlstead of 

Wherry & Wherry, P.C., Denver, Colorado, with him on the brief), 

Colorado Springs, Colorado, for Plaintiff-Appellant. 

Daniel S. Hoffman (Jeffrey A. Chase, Richard L. Gabriel and Walter 

H. Sargent of Holme Roberts & Owen LLC, Denver, Colorado, with him 

on the brief) of McKenna & Cuneo, Denver, Colorado, for 

Defendants-Appellees. 

Before BRORBY, KELLY and HENRY, Circuit Judges. 

BRORBY, Circuit Judge. 

Appellate Case: 94-1167 Document: 01019277356 Date Filed: 07/10/1995 Page: 1 
Singer-songwriter, Crystal Cartier, sued Michael Jackson and 

others for an alleged infringement of her song "Dangerous" 

copyrighted July 18, 1991. The jury returned a verdict in favor 

the defendants. Ms. Cartier appeals the district court's 

exclusion of particular evidence and appeals one of the jury 

instructions.1 

I 

Ms. Cartier allegedly wrote a song called "Dangerous" in 

1985. In January 1988, she recorded "Dangerous" as part of 

another song, "Player." Then, in October 1990, she recorded 

"Dangerous" as a song by itself. This recording of "Dangerous" 

was copyrighted in 1991. 

Michael Jackson recorded a song also called "Dangerous" in 

September 1990. Mr. Jackson recalled that his version of 

"Dangerous" grew out of a song, "Streetwalker," which he wrote 

with William Bottrell in 1985. After the release of Mr. Jackson's 

recording of "Dangerous," Ms. Cartier sued Mr. Jackson and others 

claiming the song infringed on her copyrighted song. 

II 

In demonstrating a copyright violation, Ms. Cartier tried to 

prove Mr. Jackson had access to her version of "Dangerous" before 

1 We grant Ms. Cartier's uncontested motion to supplement her 

appendix. 

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September 1990 by showing that she distributed demo tapes2 of 

"Player" in Los Angeles in July 1990 to people who were close to 

Mr. Jackson. Ms. Cartier asserts the version of "Dangerous" on 

her demo tapes was similar to her copyrighted version. 

Ms. Cartier claims to have distributed approximately twentyfive tapes while in Los Angeles and thus depleted her entire 

supply of cassettes. Because the original recording was made on a 

rented master tape, which the recording studio recycled, that copy 

too had vanished. Ms. Cartier could not locate a single copy of 

her demo tape in anticipation of this trial. None of Ms. 

Cartier's friends and family members could produce the cassettes 

given to them. Ms. Cartier tried to contact the record companies, 

but they would not speak with her. Because Ms. Cartier no longer 

had any of the demo tapes, she wanted to introduce secondary 

evidence to prove the contents of the cassettes. 

To show the contents of the lost cassettes, Ms. Cartier tried 

to introduce lyric and chord charts of the version of "Dangerous" 

on her demo tapes. Ms. Cartier also tried to introduce a 

recording that recreated this version. The recreation was 

recorded in May 1992 from Ms. Cartier's memory of the version 

distributed two years earlier. 

2 A demo tape is a recording used to demonstrate the qualities of 

the performer or piece of music. 

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Appellate Case: 94-1167 Document: 01019277356 Date Filed: 07/10/1995 Page: 3 
The district court, in response to a motion in limine, 

excluded this secondary evidence on the basis that Ms. Cartier had 

not made a sufficiently diligent search for the copies of her 

earlier work. The court held the efforts made by Ms. Cartier to 

locate a copy of the earlier version of her song were inadequate 

to satisfy the requirements of Fed. R. Evid. 1004(1) of the 

Federal Rules of Evidence. Yet, the court gave Ms. Cartier the 

opportunity to make an additional showing before trial. 

We review a district court's exclusion of evidence for an 

abuse of discretion. See Orjias v. Stevenson, 31 F.3d 995, 999 

(lOth Cir.), cert. denied, 115 S. Ct. 511 (1994). In reviewing a 

court's determination for abuse of discretion, we will not disturb 

the determination absent a distinct showing it was based on a 

clearly erroneous finding of fact or an erroneous conclusion of 

law or manifests a clear error of judgment. See Lyons v. 

Jefferson Bank & Trust, 994 F.2d 716, 727 (lOth Cir. 1993) 

(quoting Cooter & Gell v. Hartmarx Co~., 496 U.S. 384, 405 

(1990)); In re Grand Ju~ Subpoenas, 906 F.2d 1485, 1488 (lOth 

Cir. 1990). In doing so, we give deference to the district 

court's evidentiary rulings. 

The district court found Ms. Cartier's efforts to locate a 

copy of one of her demo tapes insufficient and suggested she 

should have subpoenaed the record companies. On appeal, Ms. 

Cartier does not assert error in the court's questioning of her 

search efforts as a requirement under Rule 1004(1). Instead, she 

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Appellate Case: 94-1167 Document: 01019277356 Date Filed: 07/10/1995 Page: 4 
claims the court erred in finding a diligent search would have 

encompassed a subpoena of the record companies. She contends 

subpoenaing the record companies would be futile because the 

defense has argued that the record companies either return the 

cassettes immediately or destroy them to avoid exposure to claims 

of copyright infringement. Regardless of the speculated futility 

of the search, the district court found her efforts insufficient. 

Ms. Cartier's search for her demo tapes entailed calling 

friends and former colleagues. She also searched her residence 

and her storage materials. She unsuccessfully tried to contact 

many of the record companies that had received her demo tapes. 

Neither she nor her attorneys tried to compel any of these record 

companies to respond to her requests. The evidence presented to 

the court can be read to support the judge's conclusion that Ms. 

Cartier did not make a diligent effort in trying to obtain copies 

of the demo tapes. Thus, we find the district court did not abuse 

its discretion in excluding the secondary evidence. 

Ms. Cartier also claims error in the court's focus on the 

demo tapes rather than the rented master tape. Rule 1004 of the 

Federal Rules of Evidence states "[t]he original is not required, 

and other evidence of the contents of a writing, recording, or 

photograph is admissible if ... [a]ll originals are lost or have 

been destroyed." Fed. R. Evid. 1004. Ms. Cartier argues the 

"original," for purposes of Rule 1004, was the master tape. Thus, 

the cassettes were already second generation evidence and her 

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efforts to obtain the cassettes are irrelevant. She points out 

the Federal Rules of Evidence recognize no degrees of secondary 

evidence. See 5 Jack B. Weinstein et al., Weinstein's Evidence, 

11 1004 [01] at 1004-6 - 1004-7. Accordingly, she asserts that 

because the master tape was erased she has satisfied the 

requirements of Rule 1004 (1) . Thus, the demo tapes were 

admissible as secondary evidence as well as the charts and 

recreation tape. 

However, Ms. Cartier was not trying to prove the contents of 

the rented master tape. She was trying to show Mr. Jackson had 

access to her version of "Dangerous" through her demo tapes. 

Therefore, she had to show what was on the demo tapes. In trying 

to prove the contents of these cassettes, the demo tapes 

themselves are the originals or best evidence. Arguing about the 

master tape in this context is misleading. Ms. Cartier need not, 

and in all likelihood could not, prove Mr. Jackson had access to 

her version of "Dangerous" by virtue of the contents of the rented 

master tape because Mr. Jackson's access is premised on his 

alleged exposure to the demo tapes. The "original" for which Ms. 

Cartier is trying to demonstrate the contents was the demo tape. 

Therefore, according to Rule 1004(1), she must show that the demo 

tapes, and not the rented master tape, had been lost or destroyed. 

We find no error. 

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Appellate Case: 94-1167 Document: 01019277356 Date Filed: 07/10/1995 Page: 6 
two 

III 

Ms. Cartier also appeals the district court's 

comparison tapes she wanted to play for 

exclusion of 

the jury. The 

district court excluded this demonstrative evidence in response to 

a motion in limine by the defendants. A recording engineer 

created these tapes to compare portions of Ms. Cartier's song with 

portions of Mr. Jackson's song. The tapes extracted portions from 

each version of "Dangerous." The tempo of the excerpts from Mr. 

Jackson's version of "Dangerous" was slowed, and the key of these 

excerpts was changed from the original key to accommodate this 

slowing. Various excerpts were looped back on themselves to 

repeat musical phrases which were not repeated in either original. 

The tapes also spliced together parts of the choruses which were 

not adjacent in the originals. 

The district court excluded this evidence as not "fairly and 

accurately depict[ing] the original." Ms. Cartier argues the 

court committed reversible error by failing to cite a rule of 

evidence in excluding these tapes. She also asserts that if the 

evidence was excluded pursuant to Fed. R. Evid. 403, the court 

erred in failing to articulate a balancing test. Again, we review 

the district court's decision to exclude evidence for an abuse of 

discretion. Hinds v. General Motors Corp., 988 F.2d 1039, 1048 

(lOth Cir. 1993). 

We interpret the court's conclusion that these tapes do not 

"fairly and accurately depict the original tape" as a finding that 

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these recordings would mislead the jury. See Rule 403. Reading 

the record as a whole, the district court adequately weighed the 

evidence in deciding whether to admit the comparison tapes as 

demonstrative evidence. For example, the court heard oral 

arguments from counsel on this issue and noted Ms. Cartier was not 

acting in bad faith by creating these tapes. However, the court 

found the changes made to the songs in these recordings were so 

significant that the tapes no longer represented the songs in 

question in this case. We find no abuse of discretion. 

IV 

Finally, Ms. Cartier appeals a jury instruction. Ms. Cartier 

claims it was in error for the court to instruct the jury: 

[I]n order to show substantial similarity, the Plaintiff 

must satisfy both an objective or extrinsic test and a 

subjective or intrinsic test.... The subjective or 

intrinsic test focuses on the actions of an ordinary, 

reasonable person. In applying this test, you must 

decide or determine whether an ordinary, reasonable, 

non-expert person would conclude that the total concept 

and feel of Jackson's song, "Dangerous," is 

substantially similar to the total concept and feel of 

Cartier's song, "Dangerous." Plaintiff must satisfy 

both of these tests. If you do not find that the 

plaintiff has satisfied both of these tests, then you 

must find for the defendants. 

Ms. Cartier claims the court erred in instructing the jury on the 

intrinsic feel test. She argues the intrinsic test characterized 

as the "total concept and feel" of the song has not been adopted 

as law by the Tenth Circuit. 

However, counsel did not object at trial to the jury 

instruction on the intrinsic test. The court did note an 

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objection by both parties to the extrinsic test mentioned in the 

same jury instruction, but there is no record of an objection to 

the inclusion or phrasing of the intrinsic test. Because Ms. 

Cartier's counsel failed to object with sufficient particularity 

at trial, we review only for plain error. See Considine v. 

Newspaper Agency Co~., 43 F.3d 1349, 1367 (lOth Cir. 1994). To 

constitute plain error, the district court's mistake must have 

been both obvious and substantial. Id. (quoting United States v. 

Meeks, 998 F.2d 776, 779 (lOth Cir. 1993)). 

Although the total concept and feel aspect of the subjective 

test in a copyright infringement cases has not been addressed by 

the Tenth Circuit, other circuits have adopted this test. See, 

e.g., Hartman v. Hallmark Cards, Inc., 833 F.2d 117, 120 (8th Cir. 

1987); Litchfield v. Spielberg, 736 F.2d 1352, 1356 (9th Cir. 

1984), cert. denied, 470 U.S. 1052 (1985). Because this test is 

accepted law in other circuits, it was not a substantial and 

obvious error for the district court to include it in the jury 

instructions. Also, the instruction did not infringe upon any 

substantial rights of Ms. Cartier. Accordingly, we do not find 

plain error in the jury instructions. 

v 

For the foregoing reasons, we AFFIRM the rulings of the 

district court. 

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