Equal Protection Violation

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7^th Circuit Court of Appeals

Case Name: Paramount Media Group, Inc. v. Village of Bellwood, et al.

Case No.: 17-1562

Officials: RIPPLE, SYKES, and SCUDDER, Circuit Judges.

Focus: Equal Protection Violation

In 2005 Paramount Media Group, Inc., leased a parcel of highway-adjacent property in the Village of Bellwood, Illinois, and planned to build a billboard on it. But Paramount never applied for a local permit. When the Village enacted a ban on new billboard permits in 2009, Paramount lost the opportunity to build its sign.

Paramount later sought to take advantage of an exception to the ban for village-owned property, offering to lease a different parcel of highway-adjacent property directly from the Village. But again it was foiled. The Village accepted an offer from Image Media Advertising, Inc., one of Paramount’s competitors. Its goal slipping away, Paramount sued the Village and Image Media alleging First Amendment, equal-protection, due-process, Sherman Act, and state law violations. The Village and Image Media moved for summary judgment. The district court granted the motion on the federal claims and relinquished supplemental jurisdiction over the state-law claims.

We affirm. Paramount lost its lease while the suit was pending. That mooted its claim for injunctive relief from the sign ban. The claim for damages is time-barred, except for the alleged equal-protection violation. That claim fails because Paramount was not similarly situated to Image Media. And the Village and Image Media are immune from Paramount’s antitrust claims. We need not consider whether a market-participant exception to this immunity exists because Paramount failed to support its antitrust claims.

Affirmed

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Derek A Hawkins is trademark corporate counsel for Harley-Davidson. Hawkins oversees the prosecution and maintenance of the Harley-Davidson’s international trademark portfolio in emerging markets.