Microsoft Trial Misconduct Cost $40 Million

SpuriousLogic writes "The judge who banned Microsoft from selling its Word document program in the US due to a patent violation tacked an additional $40 million onto a jury's $200 million verdict because the software maker's lawyers engaged in trial misconduct, court records reveal. In a written ruling, Judge Leonard Davis, of US District Court for Eastern Texas, chastised Microsoft's attorneys for repeatedly misrepresenting the law in presentations to jurors.'Throughout the course of trial Microsoft's trial counsel persisted in arguing that it was somehow improper for a non-practicing patent owner to sue for money damages,' Davis wrote. The judge cited a particular incident in which a Microsoft lawyer compared plaintiff i4i, Inc. to banks that sought bailout money from the federal government under the Troubled Asset Relief Program. 'He further persisted in improperly trying to equate i4i's infringement case with the current national banking crisis implying that i4i was a banker seeking a "bailout,"' Davis said."

Comments

Anyone got a PACER account?

[H4x0r Jim Duggan]

If we could see the court transcript, we'd have more info about why MS were fined x, y, z.

If someone has a PACER account, they could put the transcript on archive.org simply with the RECAP plugin:

* https://www.recapthelaw.org/

And then we could have a more complete picture on http://en.swpat.org/wiki/I4i_v._Microsoft

Re:Damnit! I'm torn!

[noundi]

Does i4i have an implementation of their patent?

This seems to be a product which is related to this patent. I don't know, slashdotters seem to be very quick to judge on the behalf of MS, claiming that i4i are patent trolls. I haven't seen any proof that they are, and until I do I'll consider this suit valid. Ironically those just spewing the phrase "patent troll" without providing any proof nor data are what? That's right -- trolls themselves.

Lawyers? Punished? Hahahahah

[gavron]

You're surprised the lawyers didn't get punished? Sir, perhaps I can point you to www.groklaw.net. SCO has been pushing outside the envelope of ethical litigation since 2003. That's SIX YEARS of doing it. They have received no sanctions, endless do-overs, and are now in a trustee Chapter-11 (instead of Chapter 7) bankruptcy.

CLEARLY lawyers not only DO NOT get punished, but are REWARDED for behaving in this manner.

The good guys (that would be us the humans, as well as the named other parties in the cases) all lose, and the unethical lawyers win.

Cheers,

Ehud

Re:Damnit! I'm torn!

[KillerBob]

I will not feed the trolls... but... it's like a train wreck...

Even its "product" is just some crapware which plugs into word and it's suspect that there is even a product, it looks like they made that page simply for the court case.

Just because you wouldn't use the product doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. You can call it Crapware all you like, but if they were making money off it, then that's all that matters. They were granted a patent on it, then Microsoft chose to implement it natively into Word, which invalidated their product. They did this without paying for the privileges. My guess is that some MS developper took it as a given that this was a good idea, and threw it into Word. The execs liked it, and they didn't bother to research whether there was competition or a patent on it.

If you were a developper on some widget for a program, you'd patented the methods and technology, and were making your livelihood off it, you'd be screaming bloody murder. The damages are a little excessive, but this is a company that's been put out of business by a developper with significantly more resources available to them deciding to ignore its patents. That's kind of why patents exist in the first place.