and Urantia Foundation as “author,” creates a rebuttable presumption that The Urantia Book is a commissioned work, and (2) Michael Foundation failed to rebut the presumption.[1] For several reasons, we disagree. First, as we noted above, the “specially commissioned work” doctrine is a creation of courts extending the 1909 Act’s “work for hire” provisions to independent contractor relationships. Because federal courts did not apply the work for hire doctrine to commissioned works until after 1965, Urantia Foundation cannot have claimed the work as a commissioned work when it filed its original certificate in 1956. See Reid, 490 U.S. at 749, 109 S.Ct. 2266 (citation omitted). The certificate cannot be prima facie evidence of a relationship embodied in a common law doctrine not yet created by the courts. Second, the jury’s determination, supported by ample evidence, that no commissioning relationship existed, does rebut the presumption.[2]
In short, under the appropriately deferential standard of review, there is ample evidence in the record to support the jury’s determination that no commissioning relationship existed between the Conduit and the Contact Commission. The district court, therefore, did not commit reversible error when it denied Urantia Foundation’s renewed motion for judgment as a matter of law on the question of whether its predecessor in interest commissioned the Conduit to create The Urantia Book.
- B. Exclusion of Barbara Newsom’s Testimony on Grounds of Unfair Surprise
Urantia Foundation moved below for a new trial based upon the district court’s exclusion of Barbara Newsom’s testimony on grounds of unfair surprise. The district court denied the motion, and Urantia Foundation on appeal asserts that this was error requiring us to remand the case to the district court for a new trial. We review the denial of a motion for a new trial for a manifest abuse of discretion. Aguinaga v. United Food & Commercial Workers Int’l Union, 998 F.2d 1463 (10th Cir.1993), cert. denied, 510 U.S. 1072, 114 S.Ct. 880, 127 L.Ed.2d 75 (1994).
Urantia Foundation proffered testimony from Newsom that the Conduit “was aware of the Urantia Papers, knew of the Contact Commission’s intent to publish them, and disclaimed any copyright in the papers.” Newsom’s testimony would have been based upon secret journals purportedly prepared by Dr. Sadler and kept in a locked file cabinet until their unexplained
- ↑ A filed copyright certificate “shall be admitted in any court as prima facie evidence of the facts stated therein.” 17 U.S.C. § 209 (repealed). This presumption is rebuttable with evidence showing affirmatively that the copyright is invalid. Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences v. Creative House Promotions, Inc., 944 F.2d 1446, 1451 (9th Cir.1991).
- ↑ Michael Foundation argues that Urantia Foundation has waived this particular formulation of the issue by failing to request a jury instruction as to the rebuttable presumption argument. We agree that, to the extent that a specific instruction as to the presumption of validity would have induced the jury to require more evidence than it otherwise would have before finding that the Conduit did not write The Urantia Book under commission from the Contact Commission, Urantia Foundation has obviously waived the issue. We need not reach the details of Michael Foundation’s waiver argument, however, as the presumption was amply rebutted by: (1) the logical impossibility of the certificate creating a presumption in favor of a relationship not recognized by the law when the certificate was recorded; and (2) more importantly, the jury’s finding, supported by adequate evidence, that no commissioning relationship existed.
