Federal Judiciary

Mirror, Mirror ... Mirror?

By Michael C. Smith

Friday a Tyler jury in Judge Leonard Davis' court rendered a verdict of willful infringement on three patents in plaintiff Mirror World's favor against defendant Apple (hence the photo from the TOS episode Mirror, Mirror instead of The Apple).  The jury found that Apple had not proved by clear and convincing evidence that the infringed claims were invalid. 

On damages, it gets a little tricky, because the jury entered the same figure for each of the three patents - $208.5 million, thus raising in Apple's mind at least the question of whether the verdict was for $625.5 million or $208.5 million.  Apple immediately filed a motion to stay entry of the judgment raising this issue and noting that the Court had not ruled on its pending motions on two of the patents.  Judge Davis denied the motion this afternoon noting (as is his usual practice) that postjudgment motions (Rule 50(b) motions, for example) must be filed and would be heard before entry of judgment.  The motions also addressed other equitable issues and set a schedule for addressing those issues.  Should be an interesteing few weeks watching all the filings in this issue and seeing whether, all things being equal, the verdict is $200 million, or $600.

Full post as published by Eastern District of Texas Federal Court Practice on October 05, 2010 (boomark / email).