Petrella v. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Inc./Opinion of the Court

delivered the opinion of the Court.

The Copyright Act of 1976 provides that “[n]o civil action shall be maintained under the [Act] unless it is commenced within three years after the claim accrued.” 17 U. S. C. § 507(b). This case presents the question whether the equitable defense of laches (unreasonable, prejudicial delay in commencing suit) may bar relief on a copyright infringement claim brought within § 507(b)’s three-year limitations period. Section 507(b), it is undisputed, bars relief of any kind for conduct occurring prior to the three-year limitations period. To the extent that an infringement suit seeks relief solely for conduct occurring within the limitations period, however, courts are not at liberty to jettison Congress’ judgment on the timeliness of suit. Laches, we hold, cannot be invoked to preclude adjudication of a claim for damages brought within the three-year window. As to equitable relief, in extraordinary circumstances, laches may bar at the very threshold the particular relief requested by the plaintiff. And a plaintiff’s delay can always be brought to bear at the remedial stage, in determining appropriate injunctive relief, and in assessing the “profits of the infringer … attributable to the infringement.” § 504(b).

Petitioner Paula Petrella, in her suit for copyright infringement, sought no relief for conduct occurring outside § 507(b)’s three-year limitations period. Nevertheless, the courts below held that laches barred her suit in its entirety, without regard to the currency of the conduct of which Petrella complains. That position, we hold, is contrary to § 507(b) and this Court’s precedent on the province of laches.

The Copyright Act (Act), 17 U. S. C. § 101 et seq., grants copyright protection to original works of authorship. § 102(a). Four aspects of copyright law bear explanation at the outset.

First, the length of a copyright term. Under the Act, a copyright “vests initially in the author or authors of the work,” who may transfer ownership to a third party. § 201. The Act confers on a copyright owner certain exclusive rights, including the rights to reproduce and distribute the work and to develop and market derivative works. § 106. Copyrighted works published before 1978—as was the work at issue—are protected for an initial period of 28 years, which may be—and in this case was—extended for a renewal period of up to 67 years. § 304(a). From and after January 1, 1978, works are generally protected from the date of creation until 70 years after the author’s death. § 302(a).

Second, copyright inheritance. For works copyrighted under the pre-1978 regime in which an initial period of protection may be followed by a renewal period, Congress provided that the author’s heirs inherit the renewal rights. See § 304(a)(1)(C)(ii)–(iv). We held in Stewart v. Abend, 495 U. S. 207 (1990), that if an author who has assigned her rights away “dies before the renewal period, then the assignee may continue to use the original work [to produce a derivative work] only if the author’s successor transfers the renewal rights to the assignee.” Id., at 221.

Third, remedies. The Act provides a variety of civil remedies for infringement, both equitable and legal. See §§ 502–505, described supra, at 668, n. 1. A court may issue an injunction “on such terms as it may deem reasonable to prevent or restrain infringement of a copyright.” § 502(a). At the election of the copyright owner, a court may also award either (1) “the copyright owner’s actual damages and any additional profits of the infringer,” § 504(a)(1), which petitioner seeks in the instant case, or (2) statutory damages within a defined range, § 504(c).

Fourth, and most significant here, the statute of limitations. Until 1957, federal copyright law did not include a statute of limitations for civil suits. Federal courts therefore used analogous state statutes of limitations to determine the timeliness of infringement claims. See S. Rep. No. 1014, 85th Cong., 1st Sess., 2 (1957) (hereinafter Senate Report). And they sometimes invoked laches to abridge the state-law prescription. As explained in Teamsters & Employers Welfare Trust of Ill. v. Gorman Bros. Ready Mix, 283 F. 3d 877, 881 (CA7 2002): “When Congress fails to enact a statute of limitations, a [federal] court that borrows a state statute of limitations but permits it to be abridged by the doctrine of laches is not invading congressional prerogatives. It is merely filling a legislative hole.” (Citation omitted.) In 1957, Congress addressed the matter and filled the hole; it prescribed a three-year lookback limitations period for all civil claims arising under the Copyright Act. See Act of Sept. 7, 1957, Pub. L. 85–313, 71 Stat. 633, 17 U. S. C. § 115(b) (1958 ed.). The provision, as already noted, reads: “No civil action shall be maintained under the provisions of this title unless it is commenced within three years after the claim accrued.” § 507(b) (2012 ed.).

The federal limitations prescription governing copyright suits serves two purposes: (1) to render uniform and certain the time within which copyright claims could be pursued; and (2) to prevent the forum shopping invited by disparate state limitations periods, which ranged from one to eight years. Senate Report 2; see H. R. Rep. No. 2419, 84th Cong., 2d Sess., 2 (1956). To comprehend how the Copyright Act’s limitations period works, one must understand when a copyright infringement claim accrues.

A claim ordinarily accrues “when [a] plaintiff has a complete and present cause of action.” Bay Area Laundry and Dry Cleaning Pension Trust Fund v. Ferbar Corp. of Cal., 522 U. S. 192, 201 (1997) (internal quotation marks omitted). In other words, the limitations period generally begins to run at the point when “the plaintiff can file suit and obtain relief.” Ibid. A copyright claim thus arises or “accrue[s]” when an infringing act occurs.

It is widely recognized that the separate-accrual rule attends the copyright statute of limitations. Under that rule, when a defendant commits successive violations, the statute of limitations runs separately from each violation. Each time an infringing work is reproduced or distributed, the infringer commits a new wrong. Each wrong gives rise to a discrete “claim” that “accrue[s]” at the time the wrong occurs. In short, each infringing act starts a new limitations period. See Stone v. Williams, 970 F. 2d 1043, 1049 (CA2 1992) (“Each act of infringement is a distinct harm giving rise to an independent claim for relief.”).

Under the Act’s three-year provision, an infringement is actionable within three years, and only three years, of its occurrence. And the infringer is insulated from liability for earlier infringements of the same work. See 3 M. Nimmer & D. Nimmer, Copyright § 12.05[B][1][b], p. 12–150.4 (2013) (“If infringement occurred within three years prior to fling, the action will not be barred even if prior infringements by the same party as to the same work are barred because they occurred more than three years previously.”). Thus, when a defendant has engaged (or is alleged to have engaged) in a series of discrete infringing acts, the copyright holder’s suit ordinarily will be timely under § 507(b) with respect to more recent acts of infringement (i. e., acts within the three-year window), but untimely with respect to prior acts of the same or similar kind. A case arising outside of the copyright context is illustrative. In Bay Area Laundry and Dry Cleaning Pension Trust Fund v. Ferbar Corp. of Cal., 522 U. S. 192 (1997), an employer was delinquent in making a series of scheduled payments to an underfunded pension plan. See id., at 198–199. The trustees filed suit just over six years after the first missed payment, barely outside of the applicable six-year statute of limitations. See id., at 198. Because the first missed payment in the series fell outside the statute of limitations, the employer argued that the subsequent missed payments were also time barred. See id., at 206. We rejected that argument. The remaining claims were timely, we held, because “each missed payment create[d] a separate cause of action with its own six-year limitations period.” Ibid. Cf. Klehr, 521 U. S., at 190 (for civil Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act claims, plaintiff may recover for acts occurring within the limitations period, but may not use an “independent, new predicate act as a bootstrap to recover for injuries caused by other earlier predicate acts that took place outside the limitations period”); National Railroad Passenger Corporation v. Morgan, 536 U. S. 101, 114–121 (2002) (distinguishing discrete acts, each independently actionable, from conduct “cumulative [in] effect,” e. g., hostile environment claims pursued under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U. S. C. § 2000e et seq.; “in direct contrast to discrete acts, a single [instance of hostility] may not be actionable on its own”). But cf. post, at 697 (ignoring the distinction Morgan took care to draw between discrete acts independently actionable and conduct cumulative in effect).

In sum, Congress provided two controlling time prescriptions: the copyright term, which endures for decades, and may pass from one generation to another; and § 507(b)’s limitations period, which allows plaintiffs during that lengthy term to gain retrospective relief running only three years back from the date the complaint was filed.

The allegedly infringing work in this case is the critically acclaimed motion picture Raging Bull, based on the life of boxing champion Jake LaMotta. After retiring from the ring, LaMotta worked with his longtime friend, Frank Petrella, to tell the story of the boxer’s career. Their venture resulted in three copyrighted works: two screenplays, one registered in 1963, the other in 1973, and a book, registered in 1970. This case centers on the screenplay registered in 1963. The registration identified Frank Petrella as sole author, but also stated that the screenplay was written “in collaboration with” LaMotta. App. 164.

In 1976, Frank Petrella and LaMotta assigned their rights in the three works, including renewal rights, to Chartoff-Winkler Productions, Inc. Two years later, respondent United Artists Corporation, a subsidiary of respondent Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Inc. (collectively, MGM), acquired the motion picture rights to the book and both screenplays, rights stated by the parties to be “exclusiv[e] and forever, including all periods of copyright and renewals and extensions thereof.” Id., at 49. In 1980, MGM released, and registered a copyright in, the film Raging Bull, directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Robert De Niro, who won a Best Actor Academy Award for his portrayal of LaMotta. MGM continues to market the film, and has converted it into formats unimagined in 1980, including DVD and Blu-ray.

Frank Petrella died in 1981, during the initial terms of the copyrights in the screenplays and book. As this Court’s decision in Stewart confirmed, Frank Petrella’s renewal rights reverted to his heirs, who could renew the copyrights unburdened by any assignment previously made by the author. See 495 U. S., at 220–221 (relying on Court’s earlier decision in Miller Music Corp. v. Charles N. Daniels, Inc., 362 U. S. 373 (1960)).

Plaintiff below, petitioner here, Paula Petrella (Petrella) is Frank Petrella’s daughter. Learning of this Court’s decision in Stewart, Petrella engaged an attorney who, in 1991, renewed the copyright in the 1963 screenplay. Because the copyrights in the 1973 screenplay and the 1970 book were not timely renewed, the infringement claims in this case rest exclusively on the screenplay registered in 1963. Petrella is now sole owner of the copyright in that work.

In 1998, seven years after filing for renewal of the copyright in the 1963 screenplay, Petrella’s attorney informed MGM that Petrella had obtained the copyright to that screenplay. Exploitation of any derivative work, including Raging Bull, the attorney asserted, infringed on the copyright now vested in Petrella. During the next two years, counsel for Petrella and MGM exchanged letters in which MGM denied the validity of the infringement claims, and Petrella repeatedly threatened to take legal action.

Some nine years later, on January 6, 2009, Petrella filed a copyright infringement suit in the United States District Court for the Central District of California. She alleged that MGM violated and continued to violate her copyright in the 1963 screenplay by using, producing, and distributing Raging Bull, a work she described as derivative of the 1963 screenplay. Petrella’s complaint sought monetary and injunctive relief. Because the statute of limitations for copyright claims requires commencement of suit “within three years after the claim accrued,” § 507(b), Petrella sought relief only for acts of infringement occurring on or after January 6, 2006. No relief, she recognizes, can be awarded for infringing acts prior to that date.

MGM moved for summary judgment on several grounds, among them, the equitable doctrine of laches. Petrella’s 18-year delay, from the 1991 renewal of the copyright on which she relied, until 2009, when she commenced suit, MGM maintained, was unreasonable and prejudicial to MGM. See Memorandum of Points and Authorities in Support of Defendants’ Motion for Summary Judgment in No. CV 09–0072 (CD Cal.).

The District Court granted MGM’s motion. See App. to Pet. for Cert. 28a–48a. As to the merits of the infringement claims, the court found, disputed issues of material fact precluded summary adjudication. See id., at 34a–42a. Even so, the court held, laches barred Petrella’s complaint. Id., at 42a–48a. Petrella had unreasonably delayed suit by not filing until 2009, the court concluded, and further determined that MGM was prejudiced by the delay. Id., at 42a–46a. In particular, the court stated, MGM had shown “expectations-based prejudice,” because the company had “made significant investments in exploiting the film”; in addition, the court accepted that MGM would encounter “evidentiary prejudice,” because Frank Petrella had died and LaMotta, then aged 88, appeared to have sustained a loss of memory. Id., at 44a–46a.

The U. S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed the laches-based dismissal. 695 F. 3d 946 (2012). Under Ninth Circuit precedent, the Court of Appeals first observed, “[i]f any part of the alleged wrongful conduct occurred outside of the limitations period, courts presume that the plaintiff’s claims are barred by laches.” Id., at 951 (internal quotation marks omitted). The presumption was applicable here, the court indicated, because “[t]he statute of limitations for copyright claims in civil cases is three years,” ibid. (citing § 507(b)), and Petrella was aware of her potential claims many years earlier (as was MGM), id., at 952. “[T]he true cause of Petrella’s delay,” the court suggested, “was, as [Petrella] admits, that ‘the film hadn’t made money’ [in years she deferred suit].” Id., at 953. Agreeing with the District Court, the Ninth Circuit determined that MGM had established expectations-based prejudice: The company had made a large investment in Raging Bull, believing it had complete ownership and control of the film. Id., at 953–954.

Judge Fletcher concurred only because Circuit precedent obliged him to do so. Id., at 958. Laches in copyright cases, he observed, is “entirely a judicial creation,” one notably “in tension with Congress’ [provision of a three-year limitations period].” Ibid.

We granted certiorari to resolve a conflict among the Circuits on the application of the equitable defense of laches to copyright infringement claims brought within the three-year lookback period prescribed by Congress. 570 U. S. 948 (2013).

We consider first whether, as the Ninth Circuit held, laches may be invoked as a bar to Petrella’s pursuit of legal remedies under 17 U. S. C. § 504(b). The Ninth Circuit erred, we hold, in failing to recognize that the copyright statute of limitations, § 507(b), itself takes account of delay. As earlier observed, see supra, at 671–672, a successful plaintiff can gain retrospective relief only three years back from the time of suit. No recovery may be had for infringement in earlier years. Profits made in those years remain the defendant’s to keep. Brought to bear here, § 507(b) directs that MGM’s returns on its investment in Raging Bull in years outside the three-year window (years before 2006) cannot be reached by Petrella. Only by disregarding that feature of the statute, and the separate-accrual rule attending § 507(b), see supra, at 670–671, could the Court of Appeals presume that infringing acts occurring before January 6, 2006, bar all relief, monetary and injunctive, for infringement occurring on and after that date. See 695 F. 3d, at 951; supra, at 675–676.

Moreover, if infringement within the three-year lookback period is shown, the Act allows the defendant to prove and offset against profits made in that period “deductible expenses” incurred in generating those profits. § 504(b). In addition, the defendant may prove and offset “elements of profit attributable to factors other than the copyrighted work.” Ibid. The defendant thus may retain the return on investment shown to be attributable to its own enterprise, as distinct from the value created by the infringed work. See Sheldon v. Metro-Goldwyn Pictures Corp., 309 U. S. 390, 402, 407 (1940) (equitably apportioning profits to account for independent contributions of infringing defendant). See also infra, at 685–688 (delay in commencing suit as a factor in determining contours of relief appropriately awarded).

Last, but hardly least, laches is a defense developed by courts of equity; its principal application was, and remains, to claims of an equitable cast for which the Legislature has provided no fixed time limitation. See 1 D. Dobbs, Law of Remedies § 2.4(4), p. 104 (2d ed. 1993) (hereinafter Dobbs) (“laches … may have originated in equity because no statute of limitations applied, … suggest[ing] that laches should be limited to cases in which no statute of limitations applies”). Both before and after the merger of law and equity in 1938, this Court has cautioned against invoking laches to bar legal relief. See Holmberg v. Armbrecht, 327 U. S. 392, 395, 396 (1946) (in actions at law, “[i]f Congress explicitly puts a limit upon the time for enforcing a right which it created, there is an end of the matter,” but “[t]raditionally …, statutes of limitation are not controlling measures of equitable relief”); Merck & Co. v. Reynolds, 559 U. S. 633, 652 (2010) (quoting, for its current relevance, statement in United States v. Mack, 295 U. S. 480, 489 (1935), that “[l]aches within the term of the statute of limitations is no defense [to an action] at law”); County of Oneida v. Oneida Indian Nation of N. Y., 470 U. S. 226, 244, n. 16 (1985) (“[A]pplication of the equitable defense of laches in an action at law would be novel indeed.”).

Because we adhere to the position that, in face of a statute of limitations enacted by Congress, laches cannot be invoked to bar legal relief, the dissent thinks we “plac[e] insufficient weight upon the rules and practice of modern litigation.” Post, at 699. True, there has been, since 1938, only “one form of action—the civil action.” Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 2. But “the substantive and remedial principles [applicable] prior to the advent of the federal rules [have] not changed.” 4 C. Wright & A. Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure § 1043, p. 177 (3d ed. 2002). Holmberg, Merck, and Oneida so illustrate. The dissent presents multiple citations, see post, at 688, 690–691, 694–695, 697–698, many of them far afield from the issue at hand, others obscuring what the cited decisions in fact ruled. Compare, e. g., post, at 688, 698, with infra, at 685–686 (describing Chirco v. Crosswinds Communities, Inc., 474 F. 3d 227 (CA6 2007)); post, at 688, 697–698, with infra, at 680, n. 16 (describing National Railroad Passenger Corporation v. Morgan, 536 U. S. 101 (2002)); post, at 694–695, with infra, at 681, n. 16 (describing Patterson v. Hewitt, 195 U. S. 309 (1904)). Yet tellingly, the dissent has come up with no case in which this Court has approved the application of laches to bar a claim for damages brought within the time allowed by a federal statute of limitations. There is nothing at all “differen[t],” see post, at 699, about copyright cases in this regard.

We turn now to MGM’s principal arguments regarding the contemporary scope of the laches defense, all of them embraced by the dissent.

Laches is listed among affirmative defenses, along with, but discrete from, the statute of limitations, in Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(c). Accordingly, MGM maintains, the plea is “available … in every civil action” to bar all forms of relief. Tr. of Oral Arg. 43; see Brief for Respondents 40. To the Court’s question, could laches apply where there is an ordinary six-year statute of limitations, MGM’s counsel responded yes, case-specific circumstances might warrant a ruling that a suit brought in year five came too late. Tr. of Oral Arg. 52; see id., at 41.

The expansive role for laches MGM envisions careens away from understandings, past and present, of the essentially gap-filling, not legislation-overriding, office of laches. Nothing in this Court’s precedent suggests a doctrine of such sweep. Quite the contrary, we have never applied laches to bar in their entirety claims for discrete wrongs occurring within a federally prescribed limitations period. MGM pretends otherwise, but the cases on which it relies do not carry the load MGM would put on them. Morgan, described supra, at 672, n. 7, is apparently MGM’s best case, for it is cited 13 times in MGM’s brief. See Brief for Respondents 8, 9, 14, 16, 18, 19, 25, 31, 34, 35, 36, 40, 47; post, at 688, 694, 697. Morgan, however, does not so much as hint that laches may bar claims for discrete wrongs, all of them occurring within a federal limitations period. Part II–A of that opinion, dealing with the separate-accrual rule, held that “[e]ach discrete discriminatory act starts a new clock for filing charges alleging that act,” regardless of whether “past acts” are time barred. 536 U. S., at 113. Parts II–B and II–C of the opinion then distinguished separately accruing wrongs from hostile-work-environment claims, cumulative in effect and extending over long periods of time. Id., at 115–117, 121. Laches could be invoked, the Court reasoned, to limit the continuing violation doctrine’s potential to rescue untimely claims, not claims accruing separately within the limitations period.

Bay Area Laundry, described, along with Morgan, supra, at 672, n. 7, is similarly featured by MGM. See also post, at 694, 697. But that opinion considered laches only in the context of a federal statute calling for action “[a]s soon as practicable.” 29 U. S. C. § 1399(b)(1); see 522 U. S., at 205. Patterson v. Hewitt, 195 U. S. 309 (1904), described by MGM as a case resembling Petrella’s, see Tr. of Oral Arg. 32–33, 53, barred equitable claims that were timely under state law. When state law was the reference, federal courts sometimes applied laches as a further control. See supra, at 669–670; Russell v. Todd, 309 U. S. 280, 288, n. 1 (1940) (“Laches may bar equitable remedy before the local statute has run.”). No federal statute of limitations figured in Patterson. Inviting individual judges to set a time limit other than the one Congress prescribed, we note, would tug against the uniformity Congress sought to achieve when it enacted § 507(b). See supra, at 669–670.

MGM observes that equitable tolling “is read into every federal statute of limitation,” Holmberg, 327 U. S., at 397, and asks why laches should not be treated similarly. See Brief for Respondents 23–26; post, at 694–695. Tolling, which lengthens the time for commencing a civil action in appropriate circumstances, applies when there is a statute of limitations; it is, in effect, a rule of interpretation tied to that limit. See Young v. United States, 535 U. S. 43, 49–50 (2002); Johnson v. Railway Express Agency, Inc., 421 U. S. 454, 464 (1975). Laches, in contrast, originally served as a guide when no statute of limitations controlled the claim; it can scarcely be described as a rule for interpreting a statutory prescription. That is so here, because the statute, § 507(b), makes the starting trigger an infringing act committed three years back from the commencement of suit, while laches, as conceived by the Ninth Circuit and advanced by MGM, makes the presumptive trigger the defendant’s initial infringing act. See 695 F. 3d, at 951; Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 16.

MGM insists that the defense of laches must be available to prevent a copyright owner from sitting still, doing nothing, waiting to see what the outcome of an alleged infringer’s investment will be. See Brief for Respondents 48. In this case, MGM stresses, “[Petrella] conceded that she waited to fie because ‘the film was deeply in debt and in the red and would probably never recoup.’ ” Id., at 47 (quoting from App. 110). The Ninth Circuit similarly faulted Petrella for waiting to sue until the film Raging Bull “made money.” 695 F. 3d, at 953 (internal quotation marks omitted). See also post, at 689–692 (deploring plaintiffs who wait to see whether the allegedly infringing work makes money).

It is hardly incumbent on copyright owners, however, to challenge each and every actionable infringement. And there is nothing untoward about waiting to see whether an infringer’s exploitation undercuts the value of the copyrighted work, has no effect on the original work, or even complements it. Fan sites prompted by a book or film, for example, may benefit the copyright owner. See Wu, Tolerated Use, 31 Colum. J. L. & Arts 617, 619–620 (2008). Even if an infringement is harmful, the harm may be too small to justify the cost of litigation.

If the rule were, as MGM urges, “sue soon, or forever hold your peace,” copyright owners would have to mount a federal case fast to stop seemingly innocuous infringements, lest those infringements eventually grow in magnitude. Section 507(b)’s three-year limitations period, however, coupled to the separate-accrual rule, see supra, at 669–672, avoids such litigation profusion. It allows a copyright owner to defer suit until she can estimate whether litigation is worth the candle. She will miss out on damages for periods prior to the three-year lookback, but her right to prospective injunctive relief should, in most cases, remain unaltered.

MGM points to the danger that evidence needed or useful to defend against liability will be lost during a copyright owner’s inaction. Brief for Respondents 37–38; see post, at 689–691. Recall, however, that Congress provided for reversionary renewal rights exercisable by an author’s heirs, rights that can be exercised, at the earliest for pre-1978 copyrights, 28 years after a work was written and copyrighted. See supra, at 668–669. At that time, the author, and perhaps other witnesses to the creation of the work, will be dead. See supra, at 673. Congress must have been aware that the passage of time and the author’s death could cause a loss or dilution of evidence. Congress chose, nonetheless, to give the author’s family “a second chance to obtain fair remuneration.” Stewart, 495 U. S., at 220.

Moreover, a copyright plaintiff bears the burden of proving infringement. See 3 W. Patry, Copyright § 9.4, p. 9–18 (2013) (hereinafter Patry) (“As in other civil litigation, a copyright owner bears the burden of establishing a prima facie case.”). But cf. post, at 691 (overlooking plaintiff’s burden to show infringement and the absence of any burden upon the defendant “to prove that it did not infringe”). Any hindrance caused by the unavailability of evidence, therefore, is at least as likely to affect plaintiffs as it is to disadvantage defendants. That is so in cases of the kind Petrella is pursuing, for a deceased author most probably would have supported his heir’s claim.

The registration mechanism, we further note, reduces the need for extrinsic evidence. Although registration is “permissive,” both the certificate and the original work must be on file with the Copyright Office before a copyright owner can sue for infringement. 17 U. S. C. §§ 408(b), 411(a). Key evidence in the litigation, then, will be the certificate, the original work, and the allegedly infringing work. And the adjudication will often turn on the factfinder’s direct comparison of the original and the infringing works, i. e., on the factfinder’s “good eyes and common sense” in comparing the two works’ “total concept and overall feel.” Peter F. Gaito Architecture, LLC v. Simone Development Corp., 602 F. 3d 57, 66 (CA2 2010) (internal quotation marks omitted).

Finally, when a copyright owner engages in intentionally misleading representations concerning his abstention from suit, and the alleged infringer detrimentally relies on the copyright owner’s deception, the doctrine of estoppel may bar the copyright owner’s claims completely, eliminating all potential remedies. See 6 Patry § 20:58, at 20–110 to 20–112. The test for estoppel is more exacting than the test for laches, and the two defenses are differently oriented. The gravamen of estoppel, a defense long recognized as available in actions at law, see Wehrman v. Conklin, 155 U. S. 314, 327 (1894), is misleading and consequent loss, see 6 Patry § 20:58, at 20–110 to 20–112. Delay may be involved, but is not an element of the defense. For laches, timeliness is the essential element. In contrast to laches, urged by MGM entirely to override the statute of limitations Congress prescribed, estoppel does not undermine Congress’ prescription, for it rests on misleading, whether engaged in early on, or later in time.

Stating that the Ninth Circuit “ha[d] taken a wrong turn in its formulation and application of laches in copyright cases,” Judge Fletcher called for fresh consideration of the issue. 695 F. 3d, at 959. “A recognition of the distinction between … estoppel and laches,” he suggested, “would be a good place to start.” Ibid. We agree.

The courts below summarily disposed of Petrella’s case based on laches, preventing adjudication of any of her claims on the merits and foreclosing the possibility of any form of relief. That disposition, we have explained, was erroneous. Congress’ time provisions secured to authors a copyright term of long duration, and a right to sue for infringement occurring no more than three years back from the time of suit. That regime leaves “little place” for a doctrine that would further limit the timeliness of a copyright owner’s suit. See 1 Dobbs § 2.6(1), at 152. In extraordinary circumstances, however, the consequences of a delay in commencing suit may be of sufficient magnitude to warrant, at the very outset of the litigation, curtailment of the relief equitably awardable.

Chirco v. Crosswinds Communities, Inc., 474 F. 3d 227 (CA6 2007), is illustrative. In that case, the defendants were alleged to have used without permission, in planning and building a housing development, the plaintiffs’ copyrighted architectural design. Long aware of the defendants’ project, the plaintiffs took no steps to halt the housing development until more than 168 units were built, 109 of which were occupied. Id., at 230. Although the action was filed within § 507(b)’s three-year statute of limitations, the District Court granted summary judgment to the defendants, dismissing the entire case on grounds of laches. The trial court’s rejection of the entire suit could not stand, the Court of Appeals explained, for it was not within the Judiciary’s ken to debate the wisdom of § 507(b)’s three-year lookback prescription. Id., at 235. Nevertheless, the Court of Appeals affirmed the District Court’s judgment to this extent: The plaintiffs, even if they might succeed in proving infringement of their copyrighted design, would not be entitled to an order mandating destruction of the housing project. That relief would be inequitable, the Sixth Circuit held, for two reasons: The plaintiffs knew of the defendants’ construction plans before the defendants broke ground, yet failed to take readily available measures to stop the project; and the requested relief would “work an unjust hardship” upon the defendants and innocent third parties. Id., at 236. See also New Era Publications Int’l v. Henry Holt & Co., 873 F. 2d 576, 584–585 (CA2 1989) (despite awareness since 1986 that book containing allegedly infringing material would be published in the United States, copyright owner did not seek a restraining order until 1988, after the book had been printed, packed, and shipped; as injunctive relief “would [have] result[ed] in the total destruction of the work,” the court “relegat[ed plaintiff] to its damages remedy”).

In sum, the courts below erred in treating laches as a complete bar to Petrella’s copyright infringement suit. The action was commenced within the bounds of § 507(b), the Act’s time-to-sue prescription, and does not present extraordinary circumstances of the kind involved in Chirco and New Era. Petrella notified MGM of her copyright claims before MGM invested millions of dollars in creating a new edition of Raging Bull. And the equitable relief Petrella seeks—e. g., disgorgement of unjust gains and an injunction against future infringement—would not result in “total destruction” of the film, or anything close to it. See New Era, 873 F. 2d, at 584. MGM released Raging Bull more than three decades ago and has marketed it continuously since then. Allowing Petrella’s suit to go forward will put at risk only a fraction of the income MGM has earned during that period and will work no unjust hardship on innocent third parties, such as consumers who have purchased copies of Raging Bull. Cf. Chirco, 474 F. 3d, at 235–236 (destruction remedy would have ousted families from recently purchased homes). The circumstances here may or may not (we need not decide) warrant limiting relief at the remedial stage, but they are not sufficiently extraordinary to justify threshold dismissal.

Should Petrella ultimately prevail on the merits, the District Court, in determining appropriate injunctive relief and assessing profits, may take account of her delay in commencing suit. See supra, at 668, 677–678. In doing so, however, that court should closely examine MGM’s alleged reliance on Petrella’s delay. This examination should take account of MGM’s early knowledge of Petrella’s claims, the protection MGM might have achieved through pursuit of a declaratory judgment action, the extent to which MGM’s investment was protected by the separate-accrual rule, the court’s authority to order injunctive relief “on such terms as it may deem reasonable,” § 502(a), and any other considerations that would justify adjusting injunctive relief or profits. See Haas v. Leo Feist, Inc., 234 F. 105, 107–108 (SDNY 1916) (adjudicating copyright infringement suit on the merits and decreeing injunctive relief, but observing that, in awarding profits, account may be taken of copyright owner’s inaction until infringer had spent large sums exploiting the work at issue). See also Tr. of Oral Arg. 23 (Government observation that, in fashioning equitable remedies, court has considerable leeway; it could, for example, allow MGM to continue using Raging Bull as a derivative work upon payment of a reasonable royalty to Petrella). Whatever adjustments may be in order in awarding injunctive relief, and in accounting for MGM’s gains and profits, on the facts thus far presented, there is no evident basis for immunizing MGM’s present and future uses of the copyrighted work, free from any obligation to pay royalties.

For the reasons stated, the judgment of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

It is so ordered.