## Facts

- Elinor Shapiro sued Hasbro, Inc. in the Central District of California, asserting a claim for misappropriation of trade secrets arising from toy-related ideas and materials she said she shared with Hasbro in confidence.
- Hasbro disputed misappropriation and argued, among other defenses, that the features Shapiro claimed as trade secrets were not secret because similar products existed earlier in the marketplace.
- To support that position, Hasbro submitted a declaration from its counsel, Joshua Krumholz.
- Attached to Krumholz’s declaration were exhibits consisting of Ertl “My Little Angel” toys (and/or photographs of those toys) offered as examples of similar prior products.
- The toys bore an inscription stating: “© 1993 The Ertl Company, Inc.”
- Shapiro moved to exclude the Ertl toy exhibits, arguing that Hasbro had not properly authenticated them for evidentiary use.
- The dispute centered on whether Hasbro had laid a sufficient foundation under the Federal Rules of Evidence to show the exhibits were what Hasbro claimed—authentic “My Little Angel” toys from the early 1990s—so the court could consider them in motion practice.
- Hasbro responded that the declaration and the toys’ identifying characteristics, including the copyright marking, supplied the required foundation and that Shapiro’s objections went to credibility and probative value, not admissibility.

## Issues

1. Did Hasbro present evidence sufficient under Federal Rule of Evidence 901 to authenticate the Ertl “My Little Angel” toy exhibits for consideration in the case?
2. If Shapiro disputed the exhibits’ genuineness or significance, did those disputes require exclusion, or did they go to the weight of the evidence?

## Decision

- The court denied Shapiro’s motion to exclude the Ertl toy exhibits.
- The court held Hasbro made a sufficient prima facie showing that the exhibits were what Hasbro claimed they were, satisfying Rule 901’s authentication threshold.
- The court ruled that Shapiro’s remaining challenges concerned the weight of the exhibits rather than their admissibility.

## Legal Principles

- Under Federal Rule of Evidence 901(a), the proponent must produce evidence sufficient to support a finding that the item is what the proponent claims it is.
- Authentication is a threshold showing; the proponent need not prove authenticity beyond dispute as a condition of admissibility.
- A court may consider distinctive characteristics and markings on an item (including labels or inscriptions) together with the circumstances of production to find adequate authentication.
- Once a minimal foundation for authenticity is established, arguments that the item is unreliable, misleading, or not as probative as claimed generally affect the weight the court (or factfinder) should give the evidence, not whether the evidence may be considered at all.

## Conclusion

In Shapiro’s trade-secret action against Hasbro, the court refused to exclude Hasbro’s “My Little Angel” toy exhibits because Hasbro provided enough foundational evidence—through a declaration and the toys’ identifying markings, including a “© 1993 The Ertl Company, Inc.” inscription—to meet Rule 901’s authentication requirement; any further disagreement about what the exhibits proved was left to weight rather than admissibility.


Shapiro v. Hasbro, Inc., No. CV 15-02964-BRO (AJWx), 2016 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 193658 (2016)