On May 21, 2015, the heirs of Sherlock Holmes author Arthur Conan Doyle filed a lawsuit against Defendants Penguin Random House, Roadside Attractions, LLC, Miramax, LLC, Mitch Cullin, and William Condon, in New Mexico Federal Court that alleges the up – coming film, Mr. Holmes, which features the famous detective near the end of his life, reads upon the last ten of Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories, published between 1923 and 1927 in violation of the Copyright Act and the Lanham Act

Mitch Cullin, according to the Claim, grew up in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and through his father became acquainted with the noted Sherlockian scholar and collector John Bennett Shaw, who, also, lived in Santa Fe. Mitch Cullin (“Mr. Cullin”) had access to all of Conan Doyle’s works in Mr. Shaw’s library.  Mr. Cullin’s dedication of A Slight Trick of the Mind included a dedication to “the late John Bennett Shaw, who once left me in charge of his library.”  It is apparent from A Slight Trick of the Mind, a story of Holmes in retirement, that Mr. Cullin read deeply in Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories, including those protected by the Copyright Act.

The first fifty of Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes short stories and novels are in the public domain. But the last ten of his original Sherlock Holmes stories,published between 1923 and 1927 (the Ten Stories), remain protected by copyright in the United States. These copyrighted ten stories develop the details of Holmes’s fictional retirement and change and develop the character of Holmes himself.

Case: Conan Doyle Estate v. Miramax, LLC., et.al.