[DO NOT PUBLISH]

In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Eleventh Circuit

____________________

No. 24-10228

Non-Argument Calendar

____________________

JESSE REGALADO, 

Plaintiff-Appellant,

versus

ATRIUM HEALTH, 

Defendant-Appellee.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Northern District of Georgia

D.C. Docket No. 4:23-cv-00114-WMR

____________________

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Before JORDAN, NEWSOM, and ANDERSON, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:

Jesse Regalado, proceeding pro se, appeals the district court’s

dismissal of his claims against Atrium Health and some motions he 

filed. Mr. Regalado asserted claims for copyright infringement,

misappropriation of a trade secret, conversion, and filing of false 

documents under Georgia law. The district court granted Atrium 

Health’s motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim, and also denied Mr. Regalado’s motions for recusal and for reconsideration. 

The district court denied these motions. Upon careful review, we

affirm the district court’s rulings.

I

Mr. Regalado is a resident of Trion, a town in Chattooga 

County, Georgia. In April of 2021, he fell ill and required medical 

attention. Because Chattooga County had no hospital or emergency health care facility at the time, he drove to Rome, Georgia—

a city in neighboring Floyd County—for medical attention. Following this experience, Mr. Regalado began researching ways to 

convince local officials to build a hospital in Trion. 

According to Mr. Regalado, a certificate of need is required 

to build a health care facility in towns or cities of a certain size. Mr. 

Regalado alleges that another Georgia county, Dalton County, obtained a certificate of need based on the Spanish flu pandemic. Accordingly, Mr. Regalado concluded that Trion could use the Covid19 pandemic as the basis to obtain a certificate of need. To that 

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end, Mr. Regalado prepared a Google Slides presentation with information on how local officials could build a hospital in Trion. 

In October of 2021, Mr. Regalado met with Trion’s Mayor, 

Larry Stansell, and shared with him his idea of building a 

healthcare center in Trion. According to Mr. Regalado, Mr. Stansell 

responded with hostility until Mr. Regalado assured him that Trion 

could obtain a certificate of need because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Mr. Stansell also told Mr. Regalado that he had been trying

for two decades, without success, to build a hospital in Trion. Mr. 

Regalado then promised to email his plans to Mr. Stansell after their 

meeting. Mr. Regalado’s plans were detailed in the Google Slides 

presentation, which he emailed to Mr. Stansell the following day. 

Mr. Regalado also personally delivered a physical copy of the 

Google Slides to Mr. Stansell’s office.

In November of 2021, Trion elected a new Mayor, Mr. Lanny 

Thomas. Mr. Regalado met with Mr. Thomas and told him about

his idea of building a healthcare center in Trion. In January of 2022, 

Mr. Regalado emailed the Google Slides to Mr. Thomas and personally delivered a physical copy to Trion’s City Hall. 

On February 28, 2022, Mr. Regalado returned to Trion’s City 

Hall to meet with Mr. Thomas again. Mr. Thomas was unavailable, 

but his secretary told Mr. Regalado that his plans had been sent to 

other local officials, including Mr. Blake Elsberry, who was a Commissioner for Chattooga County.

On the same day, Mr. Regalado met with Mr. Elsberry and 

shared with him his idea. He also told Mr. Elsberry about his discussions with the former and current Mayors of Trion. According 

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to Mr. Regalado, Mr. Elsberry said that he also had plans of building 

a hospital in Trion. As he had with the other local officials, Mr. 

Regalado sent Mr. Elsberry a copy of the Google Slides via email 

and personally delivered a physical copy to Mr. Elsberry’s secretary. 

Mr. Regalado did not receive a response from any of the 

Chattooga County officials. 

In August of 2022, however, Mr. Regalado discovered 

through a billboard that Atrium Health planned to build an emergency 24-hour healthcare facility in Trion. Believing that Atrium

Health had wrongfully obtained his plans from Chattooga County 

officials, Mr. Regalado filed a complaint in the district court asserting claims of copyright infringement, misappropriation of a trade 

secret, conversion, and filing of false documents.

Atrium Health filed a motion to dismiss pursuant to Federal 

Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), arguing that Mr. Regalado had 

failed to state any claims upon which relief could be granted. The 

district court agreed and granted the motion to dismiss. As to the 

copyright claim, the district court ruled that Mr. Regalado had not 

stated a claim because he failed to allege anything beyond the theft 

of his idea. With respect to the trade secret claim, the district court 

concluded that Mr. Regalado’s claim failed because he had not alleged that he took reasonable efforts to maintain the confidentiality

of his research plans. The district court also reasoned that the conversion claim was preempted under Georgia law, and that the claim 

of filing false documents was unsupported by any factual allegations and legally unavailable as a cause of action.

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Mr. Regalado subsequently filed a motion asking the district

court to reconsider its dismissal of his complaint. In his motion, 

Mr. Regalado argued that the district court had erroneously applied 

“the collateral estoppel and re[s] judicata [d]octrine[s]. . .” and that 

it “erred in failing to apply [j]udicial [e]stoppel.” The district court 

denied this motion. In doing so, it noted that its dismissal of Mr. 

Regalado’s complaint was not based on any of the grounds he asserted in his motion for reconsideration, and that he could not raise 

arguments for the first time in a motion for reconsideration. 

Shortly after he filed his complaint against Atrium Health, 

Mr. Regalado filed a motion for recusal. He asserted that recusal 

was warranted because the district judge was biased for various reasons including religion, race, political affiliation, and familiarity 

with his case against the Chattooga County officials. Mr. Regalado

also asserted that the district judge was hostile towards him and did 

not let him argue or speak in court. The district court denied his

motion because it concluded that Mr. Regalado had failed to assert

a valid ground for recusal.

Separately, Mr. Regalado filed suit against Chattooga 

County, the Town of Trion, and the City of Summerville pursuant 

to 42 U.S.C. § 1983. That case was assigned to the same district 

judge presiding over Mr. Regalado’s case against Atrium Health. 

The county officials moved for dismissal for failure to state a claim, 

and the district court granted their motion.1 

1 Mr. Regalado appealed that dismissal, but we affirmed. See Regalado v. Town 

of Trion, No. 23-12258 (11th Cir. Mar. 14, 2024).

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Mr. Regalado now appeals the district court’s dismissal of his 

complaint as well as the denial of his motions for reconsideration 

and recusal. 

II

We review a district court’s grant of a Rule 12(b)(6) motion 

de novo, accepting the allegations in the complaint as true and construing them in the light most favorable to the plaintiff. See Hill v. 

White, 321 F.3d 1334, 1335 (11th Cir. 2003). Although we construe 

pro se pleadings liberally, “. . .we require[ ] them to conform to procedural rules.” Loren v. Sasser, 309 F.3d 1296, 1304 (11th Cir. 2002). 

“[C]onclusory allegations, unwarranted deductions of facts or legal 

conclusions masquerading as facts will not prevent dismissal.” Oxford Asset Mgmt., Ltd. v. Jaharis, 297 F.3d 1182, 1189 (11th Cir. 2002).

We review a district court’s rulings on a motion to recuse for 

abuse of discretion. See Murray v. Scott, 253 F.3d 1308, 1310 (11th 

Cir. 2001). The same deferential standard applies to our review of 

a district court’s denial of a motion for reconsideration. See Gulisano v. Burlington, Inc., 34 F.4th 935, 941 (11th Cir. 2022).

III

Mr. Regalado argues that the district court improperly dismissed his claims of copyright infringement and misappropriation 

of a trade secret. For the reasons set forth below, we conclude that 

these claims were properly dismissed.2

2 Mr. Regalado challenges the district court’s Rule 12(b)(6) rulings only as to 

his claims of copyright infringement and misappropriation of a trade secret. 

Mr. Regalado does not challenge the district court’s rulings on his claims of 

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A

To assert a claim of copyright infringement, a plaintiff must 

allege two elements: “(1) ownership of a valid copyright, and (2) 

copying of constituent elements of the work that are original.” 

Feist Publ’ns, Inc. v. Rural Tel. Serv. Co., 499 U.S. 340, 361 (1991). 

The first element requires compliance with 17 U.S.C. § 411(a), the 

applicable statute, and pursuant to § 411(a), “[r]egistration of a copyright is a precondition to filing suit for copyright infringement.” 

Fourth Estate Pub. Ben. Corp. v. Wall-Street.com, LLC, 856 F.3d 1338, 

1339 (11th Cir. 2017). Copyright protection extends to the expression of an idea, but it does not “extend to any idea, procedure, process, system, method of operation, concept, principle, or discovery, 

regardless of the form in which it is described, explained, illustrated, or embodied in such work.” 17 U.S.C. § 102(b).

Mr. Regalado’s copyright claim was properly dismissed because he failed to allege registration of a copyright. Indeed, he alleged the opposite. According to Mr. Regalado, his placement of 

the copyright symbol on his Google Slides meant that he was not 

“require[d] [to] regist[er]” his plans because they were already protected. Although Mr. Regalado is correct that registration is not 

required for protection to attach, registration is required to bring a 

lawsuit for copyright infringement. See 17 U.S.C. § 411(a) (“[N]o 

conversion and filing of false documents under Georgia law. He has abandoned those claims, and we, therefore, do not review the district court’s rulings on them. See Access Now, Inc. v. Sw. Airlines Co., 385 F.3d 1324, 1335 (11th 

Cir. 2004) (explaining that we will not address claims that have been abandoned on appeal).

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civil action for infringement of the copyright in any United States 

work shall be instituted until preregistration or registration of the 

copyright claim has been made in accordance with this title.”). See 

also Fourth Estate, 856 F.3d at 1339. Because Mr. Regalado failed to 

allege registration, his copyright claim was properly dismissed. 

B

The district court also properly dismissed Mr. Regalado’s 

claim of misappropriation of a trade secret. To assert a claim of 

misappropriation of a trade secret claim under federal law and 

Georgia law, a plaintiff must allege that “(1) [he] had a trade secret and (2) the opposing party misappropriated the trade secret.” 

Penalty Kick Mgmt. Ltd. v. Coca Cola Co., 318 F.3d 1284, 1290–91 (11th 

Cir. 2003). Both federal and Georgia law define a trade secret as 

any form and type of information that “derives independent economic value” and that which an owner has taken “reasonable” 

measures to keep secret. See 18 U.S.C. § 1839(3); O.C.G.A. § 10-1-

761. Accordingly, to assert a claim of misappropriation of a trade 

secret, the plaintiff must sufficiently allege that he took reasonable 

steps to maintain the secrecy of a trade secret freely shared with 

third parties. See Cap. Asset Rsch. Corp. v. Finnegan, 160 F.3d 683, 

686 (11th Cir. 1998). Mr. Regalado’s complaint did not do so. 

Mr. Regalado did not, for example, allege that he asked any 

of the local officials or their staff to keep his Google Slides and their 

content confidential. See Penalty Kick Mgmt. Ltd., 318 F.3d at 1291–

92 (holding that oral insistence of confidentiality and a written nondisclosure agreement were reasonable efforts to maintain secrecy). 

Indeed, anyone with access to the Google Slides could access them. 

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He also did not allege that the Google Slides were marked confidential. See Advantor Sys. Corp., 678 F.App’x 839, 855–56 (11th Cir. 

2017) (finding that labeling instruction manuals as confidential and 

warning against distribution were reasonable efforts to maintain 

secrecy).

Mr. Regalado alleged only that, although he provided his 

Google Slides to a number of local officials and their office staff, he

took “great efforts to keep the plans a secret.” This allegation is

insufficient to survive a motion to dismiss. See Oxford Asset Mgmt., 

Ltd., 297 F.3d at 1189 (“[C]onclusory allegations, unwarranted deductions of facts or legal conclusions masquerading as facts will not 

prevent dismissal.”). Because Mr. Regalado failed to allege that he 

undertook reasonable measures to maintain secrecy, the district 

court properly dismissed his claim.

IV

Mr. Regalado also challenges the district court’s denial of his 

motion for reconsideration. We find no abuse of discretion in the 

court’s denial.

As an initial matter, Mr. Regalado’s arguments in support of 

reconsideration were asserted for the first time in his motion. He 

made none of these arguments in opposition to Atrium Health’s 

motion to dismiss. A motion for reconsideration generally cannot 

be used to “raise argument or present evidence that could have 

been raised prior to the entry of judgment.” Michael Linet, Inc. v. 

Village of Wellington, 408 F.3d 757, 763 (11th Cir. 2005). 

Additionally, Mr. Regalado sought reconsideration on 

grounds the district court had neither considered nor relied on in 

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its dismissal of his complaint. The district court, for example, had 

not relied on collateral estoppel or res judicata. Consequently, the

district court did not abuse its discretion in denying the motion for

reconsideration. 

V

Mr. Regalado also argues that the district court abused its 

discretion in denying his motion for recusal. We disagree. 

A district judge must recuse himself “in any proceeding in 

which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned,” or where 

a judge “has a personal bias or prejudice concerning a party,” has 

participated as counsel in the matter, or has a financial interest in 

the matter. See 28 U.S.C. § 455(a), (b). “[O]rdinary efforts at courtroom administration”— including “judicial rulings, routine trial administration efforts, and ordinary admonishments (whether or not 

legally supportable) to counsel and to witnesses”—are generally

not reasons that warrant recusal. Liteky v. United States, 510 U.S. 

540, 555 (1994). Moreover, “judicial remarks . . . that are critical or 

disapproving of, or even hostile to, counsel, the parties, or their 

cases, ordinarily do not support a bias or partiality challenge.” Christo v. Padgett, 223 F.3d 1324, 1334 (11th Cir. 2000) (quoting Liteky, 510 U.S. at 555).

In his motion for recusal, Mr. Regalado argued that the district judge was biased because it “acted as a bully” and “act[ed] as 

the [d]efendant[‘s] lawyer. . . .” Mr. Regalado also asserted that the 

district judge’s political affiliation, race, and familiarity with his 

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medical records and his action against the Chattooga local officials 

suggested bias and impartiality. 

Nothing in the record supports Mr. Regalado’s claims of 

bias, impartiality, or mistreatment. The district court’s rulings, as 

well as its adjudication of Mr. Regalado’s case against the Chattooga local officials, fall within the scope of “ordinary efforts at 

courtroom administration.” Liteky, 510 U.S. at 556. We have not 

found, and Mr. Regalado has not identified, anything in the record 

that gives us “significant doubt” about the district court’s impartiality. See Parker v. Connors Steel Co., 855 F.2d 1510, 1524 (11th Cir. 

1988). Accordingly, we affirm the district court’s denial of Mr. Regalado’s motion for recusal. 

V

For the reasons set forth above, we affirm.

AFFIRMED.

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