On October 23, 2014, in Chicago Building Design, P.C. v. Mongolian House, Inc., the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit held that an architecture firm's copyright infringement claims against its former client and another architect were timely because the plaintiff alleged infringing acts that occurred within the preceding three years (No. 12-3037, (7th Cir. Oct. 23, 2014)). The Seventh Circuit reversed the US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois's dismissal of the case as time-barred, rejecting the lower court's holding that the three-year copyright statute of limitations began to toll as soon as the plaintiff should reasonably have discovered the infringement. The Seventh Circuit held that under the US Supreme Court's recent decision in Petrella v. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Inc. the separate accrual rule applies and each infringing act starts the limitation clock running anew (134 S. Ct. 1962 (2014)).

In 2006, Chicago Building Design, P.C. (CBD) created blueprints for a restaurant renovation for defendant Mongolian House. Mongolian House allegedly gave these blueprints to another architect in 2008, who then filed them with the City of Chicago under his own name. A CBD employee visiting the City's office on unrelated business may have seen copies of these blueprints sometime in 2008. However, CBD was unable to confirm until May 2009 that the second architect had indeed filed copies of their blueprints as his own.

Four years after this possible sighting, in February 2012, CBD sued Mongolian House, its owners and the second architect for infringing its copyrights in the blueprints. Mongolian House moved to dismiss all of CBD's copyright claims as untimely. The district court granted the motion, holding that the Copyright Act's three-year statute of limitations began to run in 2008 when CBD was put on inquiry notice that Mongolian House and its architect may have been infringing its copyrights (17 U.S.C. § 507(b)).

While acknowledging that inquiry notice may help identify when a reasonable plaintiff might be expected to start investigating a possible claim, the Seventh Circuit explicitly rejected inquiry notice as a trigger date for the statute of limitations. Under the Supreme Court's Petrella decision, the question to ask in copyright infringement cases is whether the complaint contains allegations of infringing acts that occurred within the three-year look-back period from the date on which the suit was filed (for more information on this Supreme Court decision, see Legal Update, US Supreme Court Rules Laches Does Not Bar "Raging Bull" Copyright Infringement Claim). Because CBD alleged acts of infringement during this period, the district court improperly dismissed the case. The court also clarified that this was not a case involving continuing and cumulative conduct, which would implicate the continuing-violation doctrine.

Potential copyright infringement plaintiffs and defendants alike should recognize that under Petrella, some copyright claims stemming from repeated infringement over time may still be viable, so long as the complaint alleges discrete infringing acts that occurred within three years of the date of suit.