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You Can Check In Any Time You Like, But Your Documents Never Leave

Nathan R. Hoeschen, Oct. 4, 2022
Protective Order

Andrew is better at this A.I. thing, mine still appear monstrous
A.I. Generated, displayed with permission

Every protective order I've ever seen has a provision at the end requiring the parties to return or (more likely) destroy any confidential information (with some limited exceptions) from the other party when the case is over. It's generally not a contentious paragraph.

Judge Fallon, however, dealt with a discovery dispute on this issue, that I was surprised had never come up before -- what happens when there are multiple unrelated defendants, as in ANDA cases? Do you destroy the documents when the relevant defendant drops out of the case, or can you keep them until the whole consolidated mess is over and done with?

Per Judge Fallon, the answer is you get to …

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Judge Noreika Rejects Waiver Argument in Case Where Both Parties Agree the Jury Made a Mistake

Andrew E. Russell, Oct. 3, 2022
Jury Objections Jury

Lawyer Objecting
AI-Generated, displayed with permission

At the jury trial in ArcherDX, LLC v. Qiagen Sciences, LLC, C.A. No. 19-1019-MN (D. Del.), the plaintiffs argued for $752,006 in U.S. royalties, and the jury awarded $1,593,762.

The higher number happened to exactly match the $752,006 they asked for for U.S. royalties, plus the lost profits number:

The $1,593,762 U.S. royalty award, however, is much higher than the estimate provided by Plaintiffs’ expert, and, in fact is equivalent to the expert’s suggested award for lost profits ($841,756) plus U.S. royalties ($752,006).

The parties both agreed that it was a mistake, and that the jury had intended to award the $752,006 that plaintiffs had asked for.

Plaintiffs, however, refused to give …

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Patent Marking: Better Watch Those Burdens of Proof, or You'll Lose Your Pre-Suit Damages

Andrew E. Russell, Sept. 30, 2022
Summary Judgment Pre-Suit Damages

Here's an AI-generated patentee dealing with the burden of proof on marking.
Here's an AI-generated patentee dealing with the burden of proof on marking. AI-Generated, displayed with permission

My co-blogger Nate wrote yesterday about Magistrate Judge Hall's discussion of prior art estoppel in Innovative Memory Systems Inc. v. Micron Technology Inc., No. 14-1480-RGA (D. Del. Sept. 29, 2022). That was actually just one issue the Court dealt with in a lengthy R&R and Order on a summary judgment and Daubert. I wanted to post about one of the other issues Judge Hall addressed in that opinion: patent marking.

Marking is an important and sometimes underrated issue. It's not uncommon, in patent cases, for the bulk of the damages to have accrued in the years prior to the plaintiff filing suit. These "pre-suit" damages can be at risk, though, if the patentee sold products that practice the patent and failed to mark them under 35 U.S.C. § 287(a). Here is how Judge Hall explained it in Innovative Memory:

[W]hen a plaintiff makes or sells a product practicing its patent, the plaintiff can only recover pre-suit damages from an infringer if (1) the patentee marked its product in the manner specified in § 287(a) or (2) the patentee notified the infringer of its infringement. Even if a plaintiff patentee doesn’t make or sell anything, it cannot recover pre-suit damages (absent providing notice) if a prior owner of the patent failed to mark its products covered by the patent.

One interesting thing about marking, ...

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Court Permits Reliance on Non-Prior Art Documents as Evidence of Prior Art

Andrew E. Russell, Sept. 28, 2022
FRE 803 Hearsay

AI-generated image of a defendant relying on non-prior art documents as evidence of prior art
AI-generated image of a defendant relying on non-prior art documents as evidence of prior art Andrew E. Russell, displayed with permission

Judge Stark issued an oral order yesterday addressing a motion in limine in Otsuka Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. v. Zenara Pharma Private Ltd., C.A. No. 19-1938-LPS (D. Del.).

According to the briefing, plaintiff sought to exclude two exhibits that were dated after the priority date of the patent.

The first was a 2005 "review article" published just months after the priority date. According to defendants' brief, "does not present original data" and instead "discusses the information known in the art before the priority date."

The second exhibit was published in 2021 and includes a "history of research …

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Redact, Don't Do It

Nathan R. Hoeschen, Sept. 27, 2022
Redactions

Why did they play this song at my prom? I am not that old, and it is surprisingly hard to dance to
Honey Fangs, Unsplash

For the past year or so, we've been tracking Judge Andrews' new practice of rejecting filings that redact exhibits in their entirety with a docket entry like the below:

The redacted filings (D.I. 453 , 454 , and 458 ) are REJECTED because parts of them are redacted in their entirety. Absent a compelling reason, supported by a statement under oath by a party, redactions in their entirety are impermissible; redactions must be done so as to redact the least possible amount of the materials submitted. Failure to make a good faith attempt at such redactions may result in sanctions, the most common of which would be simply unsealing the entire filing. Redacting in its entirety …
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Court Rejects Parties' Request to Change Trial Scope After Fed. Cir. Vacates Previous Trial Result

Andrew E. Russell, Sept. 26, 2022
Trial Motion in Limine

Chart

Procedural opinions about post-appeal trials are relatively rare, at least compared to the amount of decisions on motions to dismiss or summary judgment that we see. Most cases settle long before they reach this stage. So I thought it was worth posting about how Judge Bataillon handled a new trial in C R Bard Inc. v AngioDynamics, Inc., C.A. No. 15-218-JFB-SRF (D. Del.) after the Federal Circuit vacated the result of the previous trial.

The parties in the case sought to introduce new information in the new trial, including at least one accused product that was released after the previous trial. The Court rejected that idea, holding that the new trial would be a direct repeat of …

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Plaintiff's "'Cut and Paste' Approach Cannot Be a Viable Pleading Strategy"

Andrew E. Russell, Sept. 23, 2022
Complaint Legal Writing

Mel Poole
Mel Poole, Unsplash

Judge Burke issued an oral order earlier this week with some interesting language criticizing the party's attempt at an amended complaint.

In Midwest Energy Emissions Corp. v. Arthur J. Gallagher & Co., C.A. No. 19-1334-CJB (D. Del.), the plaintiff accused a very large number of entities—More than 50, it looks like—with infringement of a number of patents, all in a single combined action.

Earlier this year, it moved to amend its complaint to add additional defendants it alleged were parent companies of defendants who were as acting as the parent companies' "alter egos and agents." Judge Burke granted this request as to one party, for which the complaint included more detailed factual allegations, …

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Judge Williams Orders Parties to Rank SJ Motions

Nathan R. Hoeschen, Sept. 20, 2022
Summary

You were warned this would happen.

Race Track
Adi Goldstein, Unsplash

Judge Williams issued in interesting order today in CAO Lighting, Inc. v. General Electric Company, C.A. No. 20-681-GBW, D.I. 330 (Oral Order) (D. Del. Sept. 20, 2022). CAO is one of Judge Williams' new cases which is nearest to trial (currently its set for October 24) and it has several pending SJ motions from both sides.

Taking a page from Judge Connolly's playbook, Judge Williams ordered the parties to submit letters ranking their respective SJ motions, "with the understanding that once the Court denies summary judgment as to any single ground raised in [the party's] motion, the Court will not address any summary judgment grounds that were …

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How Much Information Do You Need in a Joint Status Report in the District of Delaware? Another Data Point

Andrew E. Russell, Sept. 19, 2022
Joint Status Report Sua Sponte

Our status report, your honor? We're all good.
Our status report, your honor? We're all good. Sincerely Media, Unsplash

As we've mentioned in the past, in D. Del. patent cases, the Court often sets deadlines for submission of a "status report" (or, sometimes, a "joint status report" or "interim status report").

These orders can be somewhat vague. The Court doesn't always request "a joint status report regarding xyz." Instead, at times, it will issue a generic request for a status report, like this:

ORAL ORDER - IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that, on or before 9/23/2022, the parties shall submit a joint status report. ORDERED by Judge Maryellen Noreika on 9/16/2022.

To which the natural human response is "a status report about what?" Usually, though, it's pretty obvious from the docket. In the case above, C.A. No. 21-459-MN, the case is stayed pending appeal of another case, and the order follows a more than year-long delay with no action. The Court probably wants to know the status of the appeal.

The next question is often "how much detail does the Court want?" The answer seems to vary depending on the context. It's usually safe to assume that the Court does not want disputes or argument from the parties, and that it likely appreciates a concise statement of only what the Court needs to know to take action. But it can be hard to say for sure ...

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Judge Noreika Questions Failure to Appear for a Hearing, After Counsel Allegedly Mistreated Confidential Information

Andrew E. Russell, Sept. 16, 2022
Protective Order LR 26.2

Fire Extinguisher
Piotr Chrobot, Unsplash

An interesting transcript just hit the docket in CBV, Inc. v. ChanBond, LLC, C.A. No. 21-1456-GBW (D. Del.), a contract case, after the transcript restrictions expired. The hearing itself took place back in April, before Judge Noreika.

In the case, defendant ChanBond filed a letter seeking emergency relief after it inadvertently served a sealed filing on out-of-town counsel for another party, who allegedly took the position that he need not maintain the confidentiality of the document, either under the Court's order sealing the document or local rule 26.2 (which provides a confidentiality obligation prior to the entry of a protective order, as explained below).

Out-of-town counsel responded to the request for emergency …

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