Conflicts of Interest Waived … Mostly

Photo by Carol M. Highsmith

Ruling on the defendant’s objections to the magistrate judge’s order denying its motion to disqualify plaintiff’s counsel, Judge Schroeder noted that while the facts indicate an obvious conflict of interest, the defendant specifically waived most of the conflicts.

Pretrial Rulings in Fall Line Patents Case     

I had a great time at the recent planning meeting for the upcoming EDTX bench/bar conference in October. Pretrial rulings in this case were the subject of some gossip among the participants, so I went back and studied those I had not posted on previously, including SJ, experts, and a “novel” standing/subject matter jurisdiction argument. (And “novel” not in a good way).

Sanctions for Discovery Misconduct

Judge Schroeder ordered defendant McDonald’s counsel to pay reasonable costs and fees in the amount of $79,584.11 to the plaintiff after McDonald’s failed to comply with a number of the court’s orders compelling discovery responses.  But although the court found that McDonald’s discovery compliance has been “dilatory and incomplete”, that did not mean that the relief sought by the plaintiff was found by the court to be appropriate.

Complaints About Attorneys Fees Award Rejected


The plaintiff asserted several objections to Magistrate Judge Baxter’s award of fees, none of which Judge Schroeder agreed with. Specifically,

  • yes it can be a report and recommendation,
  • yes, you waived your objections to the court’s claim construction rulings,
  • yes, you should have known your infringement theories were unsupported when the summary judgment report came out in the companion case, and
  • yes, the case is “exceptional” – you continued to pursue theories that you knew or should have known were baseless, filed meritless motions, and argued positions that had already been rejected.