Legal Question in Civil Litigation in California

Re: Is using prior complaints for your own case plagiarism ?

No, but make sure to change the names and that the complaints survived demurrer.

Re: Is using prior complaints for your own case plagiarism ?

Congratulations on having the initiative to look up the other papers. 90% of being a successful pro per, or a successful attorney for that matter, is being able to file papers that look professional, both from a formatting perspective and from their content. The attorneys whose work you re-used (not "plagiarized") don't have time to go to the courthouse and look up -your- papers, so probably nobody will ever know what you did. Copyright law protects only the expression of ideas, not the ideas themselves, so the fact that you cited Jones v. Smith the same as some lawyer did is not copyright infringement. Just the same, I would change a couple of words (not within quotations from cases) around. Have you considered law school?

P.S. Some courts have document-imaging, so you don't need to schlep to the clerk's office to look up other people's filings. PACER (http://pacer.us.courts.gov) is a good, inexpensive (.07/page) way to look up Federal court filings in the many Federal courts that use document-imaging.

Re: Is using prior complaints for your own case plagiarism ?

NO. Most new attorneys do exactly the same thing. Just make sure that you use the complaints to guide in your drafting, not to make the specific factual allegations contained within them. Your complaint needs to state the cause of actions and the factual basis that support them in your case.