I posted the other day on Judge Gilstrap’s opinion denying the defendant’s motion to transfer venue in Raytheon v. Cray. Below is additional information on the Federal Circuit proceedings in the case, current through just a few moments ago.
Yep, I can identify with the resurrected Agent Cooper in Twin Peaks experiencing his beloved coffee for the first time in 25 years, because I get to present later this week at the State Bar Advanced Patent Litigation seminar (cosponsored by this weblog) on post trial motion practice. Regular readers will know that means I am seriously going to town on the usefulness of JMOLs, including providing a tutorial on the use of JMOL worksheets. I’ll be posting later today or tomorrow with the paper, slides, and copies of the specific JMOLs I will be addressing in detail at the conference. Technically I am presenting two days before on the topic of forum selection at the State Bar’s Advanced Civil Trial seminar in San Antonio, but due to scheduling issues, coauthor David Lopez will be presenting that one also on Friday, and I’ll include more information on it when I upload that paper.
Yesterday was EDTX day at the CAFC again, with that court ruling on appeals from three of last year’s nine Marshall patent trials. It affirmed three noninfringement defense wins in two related cases, but reversed Judge Gilstrap’s denial of the sole prevailing plaintiff’s application for an injunction in an appeal arising out of the January 2016 trial that broke the 2015-2016 EDTX defense win streak at six verdicts.
The opinions are attached with a brief explanation of each.
I typically don’t analyze CAFC rulings, but there were a couple of opinions that came out yesterday on motions for exceptional case finding under 35 USC Section 285 – one reversing a denial and one affirming a denial – that I noticed something interesting about, especially when considered in combination with the pair of reversals in Section 285 cases at the beginning of last month.
Nothing like a new set of notices of scheduling conferences to remind me that I haven’t posted on the last set yet. Accordingly, my report on the May status conferences for Judge Gilstrap’s Marshall, Texarkana and Tyler patent dockets is out and attached for subscribers, with cases, Markman and trial dates and information regarding number of defendants/consolidated cases.
It’s not EDTX, but it’s useful. A judge in another district issued an opinion in a patent case last week setting the appropriate boundaries for venue discovery, and I thought it bears reviewing in light in Judge Gilstrap’s recent opinion on the subject for two reasons. First, it tells us what parties are seeking, and second, it tells us what courts are allowing.
I once was talking to a lawyer from another state about why his side kept offering a specific piece of evidence in a patent case after the judge had – repeatedly – excluded it. He explained that where he was from, you keep offering the evidence until the judge threatens to jail you if you don’t stop. Well, we don’t do it that way here – most lawyers this way have this endearing tendency to follow court rulings once an objection is preserved, but here’s an example of a case where one side that didn’t think that was the way to go – and what followed.
A Tyler jury in Judge Rodney Gilstrap’s court rendered a verdict in a patent case Friday afternoon, finding that the defendant directly infringed, and further finding willful infringement, and rejecting the invalidity defenses of lack of written description or enablement. The jury awarded the plaintiff $4.1 million. Just how big of a win this actually was might be made clearer by the post on Judge Love’s opinion excluding a damages expert’s supplementation on the issue of indirect infringement – because I don’t see that indirect infringement was even submitted in the attached verdict.
