I heard that last week there was a mistrial in a patent action here in the District of Delaware. Looking at the dockets, it looks like it was one of the very-long-running TQ Delta cases:
- TQ Delta LLC v. 2Wire Inc., C.A. No. 13-1835-RGA (D. Del.)
The docket confirms that the Court declared a mistrial on day 2 of the trial:
Minute Entry for proceedings held before Judge Richard G. Andrews - Jury Trial day 2 held on 7/19/2022. Local counsel present for Plaintiff: R. Piergiovanni. Local counsel present for Defendant: J. Barillare. The Court declared a MISTRIAL. Trial will be rescheduled for a date TBD. (Court Reporter Heather Triozzi.) (lak) (Entered: 07/19/2022)
The docket does not say why the Court declared a mistrial. I've heard secondhand that some jurors were discussing their impressions of one of the expert witnesses prior to the close of the case, and that another juror heard that discussion and reported it to the Court.
(Of course, if you have better information, please let me know and I'll update the post!)
It looks like the preliminary instructions here, as in most (or all) cases, made very clear that the jury was not allowed to discuss the case:
First, I instruct that during the trial and until you have heard all the evidence and retired to the jury room to deliberate, you are not to discuss the case with anyone, not even amongst yourselves. If anyone should try to talk to you about the case, including a fellow juror, bring it to my attention promptly. There are good reasons for this ban on discussions, the most important being the need for you to keep an open mind throughout the presentation of evidence.
If what I heard about the mistrial is true, it sounds like one of the jurors followed the instructions very well, and some others, not so much.
A Mistrial? No Thank You!
A trial is a major production, with huge expenses for hotel and war room space, equipment rentals, transporting all of the attorneys and witnesses to Delaware, food arrangements, and attorney and paralegal time spent doing hundreds or thousands of trial preparation tasks.
A mistrial two days in means the parties are going to have to bear a lot of the expenses of trial almost twice over—and trial is the most expensive part of the case. That's a lot of cost to bear, especially for a mistrial that was neither parties' fault.
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