IP Law Daily, COPYRIGHT—N.D. Ohio: Generic design elements are both a shield and a sword in infringement case, (Jul 7, 2026)

By Matthew Hersh, J.D.

A company that borrowed aspects of a college prep high school shield escapes an infringement claim.

A metals refinery that copied aspects of a college prep high school’s shield design for its logo could not be liable for copyright infringement because it did not borrow “material of substance and value” from the original, the District Court for the Northern District of Ohio has held. The court, in dismissing the school’s copyright infringement lawsuit against the refinery, found that the shield’s diagonal striping, religious iconography, and other elements were not protectable by copyright (St. Ignatius High School Of Cleveland v. Alexy Metals, Ltd., No. 1:26-cv-00474-DAP (N.D. Ohio Jul. 6, 2026)).

The work at issue is the shield of St. Ignatius High School. a college preparatory high school founded in 1886 in Cleveland, Ohio. An employee for a metals refinery in nearby Willoughby, Alexy Metals, saw the school’s logo on a hockey puck in 2019 and suggested that the company develop a similar mark. The company’s resulting mark, which went through several iterations in 2020 and 2021, eventually made its way to the company website and on various promotional items including shirts, hats, and golf balls.

The alleged act of infringement led to several instances of litigation. The school first sued the refinery in state court for alleged trademark violations under the Lanham Act, plus various related state law claims. When the state court indicated it would be granting summary judgment for the refinery, the school then promptly brought a copyright infringement complaint. The refinery moved to dismiss the claim, leading to this decision.

Substantial similarity. The court found that the two designs were not substantially similar, thus leading it to dismiss the complaint. The court’s analysis came in two different steps.

First, the court found, many of the facts central to the infringement claim had already been established in the state court trademark litigation. Although that was a trademark as opposed to a copyright case, the district court emphasized, the state court had to determine how similar the two works were in order to decide the likelihood of consumer confusion—a determination that required the state court to determine how “distinctive” the school’s shield is. In so doing, the court noted, the state court identified a number of “generic or highly descriptive components,” including the use of diagonal stripes, religious iconography, images of wolves over a cauldron, and the school’s date of establishment. Thus, the federal court concluded, the issue of whether the school shield contained common elements “was necessarily decided in the State Action because without that determination, the court could not have determined whether consumer confusion was likely.” Those facts would have a preclusive effect in the current litigation, the court emphasized.

The court’s second finding built readily on the first. A substantial similarity analysis, the court emphasized, “is determined by a two-step test: first the unprotectable elements that were not independently created must be filtered out of the work, and then it must be determined whether the allegedly infringing work is substantially similar to the protectable elements that remain. once the generic elements identified by the state court were filtered out, the court noted, what remained post-filtration were “obvious differences between the color schemes, shading, text, and symbols on each shield logo.” Based upon a “side-by-side” comparison, the court concluded, it could readily determine that the two works were not similar, and that “an ordinary reasonable lay person would not conclude that Alexy Metals took material of substance and value from the Ignatius Shield.”

The Case is No. 1:26-cv-00474-DAP.

Judge: Polster, D.

Attorneys: Patrick A. Walsh (Frantz Ward LLP) for St. Ignatius High School of Cleveland. Melissa Bilancini (Baker & Hostetler LLP) for Alexy Metals, Ltd.

Companies: Alexy Metals, Ltd.; St. Ignatius High School of Cleveland

Cases: Copyright Trademark OhioNews