Slashdot Mirror
Unredacted Filings Reveal Claims of Juror Misconduct in Apple vs Samsung Trial
zaphod777 writes with this bit from Groklaw on more Jury related intrigue in the Apple-Samsung trial: "Samsung has now filed an unredacted version [PDF] of its motion for judgment as a matter of law, a new trial, and/or remittitur. That's the one that was originally filed with a redacted section we figured out was about the foreman, Velvin Hogan. The judge ordered it filed unsealed, and so now we get to read all about it. It's pretty shocking to see the full story. I understand now why Samsung tried to seal it. They call Mr. Hogan untruthful in voir dire (and I gather in media interviews too), accuse him of 'implied bias' and of tainting the process by introducing extraneous 'evidence' of his own during jury deliberations, all of which calls, Samsung writes, for an evidentiary hearing and a new trial with an unbiased jury as the cure."
It would seem that everyone's favorite foreman did not disclose that he was sued by Seagate for breach of contract, and that he may have had a chip on his shoulder considering that Samsung is the largest single shareholder of Seagate.
I think for lying during selection Hogan should be charged with perjury and contempt of court.
Ya go to a courthouse, and that's where some lying yahoo leads you down the garden path. But, on the other hand, if they bought the foreman's nonsensical opinions, and didn't even consider prior art - they were a bunch of scary peers.
He was asked if he had ever been involved in a lawsuit. He answered yes and cited an example. There was no followup. He answered truthfully and correctly. Sour grapes and all that.
The article says 10 years, but I'm not sure where that comes from.
The Samsung filing states he was asked “you or a family member or someone very close to you [has] ever been involved in a lawsuit, either as a plaintiff, a defendant, or as a witness?"
i.e. no time qualifier
He was asked if he was involved in any lawsuits within the last ten years, which he answered. The lawsuit with Seagate occurred in 1993 which is beyond ten years ago. Thus, he did not disclose it because it wasn't asked of him. But let's pretend he attempted to deceive the system in order to screw over Samsung because that sounds better, right?
(emphasis mine)
Where do you get "within the last ten years", it is not in the summary, the article, or the unredacted filing, which says:
“you or a family member or someone very close to you [has] ever been involved in a lawsuit, either as a plaintiff, a defendant, or as a witness?” (Reporter’s Transcript (“RT”) 148:18-21), he disclosed one such lawsuit but failed to disclose two others, including one in which he was sued by his former employer, Seagate, for breach of contract after he failed to repay a promissory note (RT 148:22-150:12; Seagate Tech., Inc. v. Hogan, Case No. MS-93-0919 (Santa Cruz Mun. Ct. June 30, 1993), Declaration of Susan Estrich (“Estrich Decl.”) Ex. A), and filed for personal bankruptcy six months later (In re Velvin R. Hogan and Carol K. Hogan, Case No. 93-58291-MM (Bankr. N.D. Cal. Dec. 27, 1993); Estrich Decl., Ex. B).
Read the F article.
The actual court transcript says that the question was
"The next question is, have you or a family member or someone very close to you ever been involved in a lawsuit, either as a plaintiff, a defendant, or as a witness?"
The answer given by Mr Hogan refers to 2008 only.
The guy is a complete nuthead. Just check out an interview with him here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9cnQcTC2JY
May I suggest this guy?
What political party do you join when you don't like Bible-thumpers *or* hippies?
He was asked if he was involved in any lawsuits within the last ten years, which he answered. The lawsuit with Seagate occurred in 1993 which is beyond ten years ago. Thus, he did not disclose it because it wasn't asked of him. But let's pretend he attempted to deceive the system in order to screw over Samsung because that sounds better, right?
Read the court transcripts before you mouth off so wrongly, o trollish one. There was no "ten year" stipulation in the question. The stipulated time period was "ever", and it was explicitly stipulated by the Judge in the voir-dire.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
the court: okay. welcome back. please take a seat. we had a few more departures in your absence. let's continue with the questions. the next question is, have you or a family member or someone very close to you ever been involved in a lawsuit, either as a plaintiff, a defendant, or as a witness?
from the voir dire transcript
where are you getting this 10 years stuff? There's no mention in the transcript that this question was limited to a 10 year period when asked by the Court.
.. but it is a little scary. My first thought was that he was essentially to carry out a simple mission. Few people would go out of their way to be on a jury. I don't know if he was paid off ( if so, good job ), had an axe gring ( if so, great job) or simply wanted some fame (mostly meh then ) from being a part of the jury on one of the relatively big cases.
Unfortunately, we won't know any time soon and anything else, at this point, is nothing but speculation. It is a shame, because I am starting the enjoy the ride. Pass the popcorn plz
This post is provided without warranty as to reliability, accuracy or otherwise or fitness for any particular purpose.
The '10 years' comment comes from an interview that the juror gave. The transcript does not back up his statement. He may have misunderstood, or maybe the transcript was wrong (I'd think unlikely). But that's the story.
Prediction for end of Universe #42: Fencepost error in Quantum_bogosort.cpp
These are Samsung's claims. Not to be taken as fact. What is interesting is how did Samsung know about he foremen's previous lawsuit? You would think they would have done a background check. Makes you wonder.
pshaw. Primary sources? Yeah, right I'll accept that when I'm dead. Get back to me when you've got a Wikipedia article or, preferably, a tweet.
He was asked if he was involved in any lawsuits within the last ten years, which he answered. The lawsuit with Seagate occurred in 1993 which is beyond ten years ago. Thus, he did not disclose it because it wasn't asked of him. But let's pretend he attempted to deceive the system in order to screw over Samsung because that sounds better, right?
(emphasis mine)
Where do you get "within the last ten years", it is not in the summary, the article, or the unredacted filing, which says:
“you or a family member or someone very close to you [has] ever been involved in a lawsuit, either as a plaintiff, a defendant, or as a witness?” (Reporter’s Transcript (“RT”) 148:18-21), he disclosed one such lawsuit but failed to disclose two others, including one in which he was sued by his former employer, Seagate, for breach of contract after he failed to repay a promissory note (RT 148:22-150:12; Seagate Tech., Inc. v. Hogan, Case No. MS-93-0919 (Santa Cruz Mun. Ct. June 30, 1993), Declaration of Susan Estrich (“Estrich Decl.”) Ex. A), and filed for personal bankruptcy six months later (In re Velvin R. Hogan and Carol K. Hogan, Case No. 93-58291-MM (Bankr. N.D. Cal. Dec. 27, 1993); Estrich Decl., Ex. B).
It's in several other articles since:
Hogan, in a phone interview yesterday, denied that there was any misconduct, saying the court instructions for potential jurors required disclosure of any litigation they were involved in within the last 10 years -- and that the 1993 bankruptcy and related litigation involving Seagate fell well outside that time range.
“Had I been asked an open-ended question with no time constraint, of course I would’ve disclosed that,” Hogan said, referring to the bankruptcy and related litigation. “I’m willing to go in front of the judge to tell her that I had no intention of being on this jury, let alone withholding anything that would’ve allowed me to be excused.”
Note: I'm not saying he's right and the Samsung brief is wrong - just that that's where the 10 year claim comes from.
If you have a PACER account, you should be able to pull up the Court Reporter's transcript from voir dire, and see what question was asked.
Oh, that's right: they believed the bollocks of this juror on a egotrip.
The jury selection wasn't hard but they managed to only follow at most half of the rules I would see as obvious.
1. anyone who owns an iphone or samsung phone, kick them off the jury
2. anyone who works with patents heavily in their own company -- oops!
The time period is irrelevant. It was a yes or no question.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Better yet the lawyer who sued the foremen is the spouse of the lawyer on Samsung's legal team! But Samsung didn't know about that until after the verdict *wink* *wink*
The problem with that is that according to the transcript he was asked a question over and above the "court instructions". The court instructions refer to a form that potential jurors are asked to fill out. The transcript refers to a direct question asked during voir dire. While it is possible that he legitimately believed that the court instructions applied to the question, that does not change the fact that he failed to answer the question as asked. It is also possible he either misunderstood the court instructions or flat out lied about them and that no such instruction was ever issued.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
What is this man doing here???
where are you getting this 10 years stuff?
This ten year stuff is a quote the juror gave Bloomberg in an interview
Hogan, in a phone interview yesterday, denied that there was any misconduct, saying the court instructions for potential jurors required disclosure of any litigation they were involved in within the last 10 years -- and that the 1993 bankruptcy and related litigation involving Seagate fell well outside that time range.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-10-03/samsung-claims-jury-foreman-misconduct-tainted-apple-case.html
It might not be in the transcript, perhaps it was in written instructions - I don't know the procedure
Watch those corners
"With regards to the Seagate suit and subsequent bankruptcy, Hogan says the court required jurors to disclose any litigation they were involved in within the last 10 years -- which he did. The 1993 Seagate business fell well outside that time range."
http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/10/03/samsung-attacks-foreman-of-jury-that-awarded-apple-1b/
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
Hence his accusation towards Samsung:
"he also wondered aloud whether Samsung "let me in the jury just to have an excuse for a new trial if it didn't go in their favor.""
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
I read the transcript from voir dire. Given the way that the questions were asked, I don't think that Mr. Hogan was given the opportunity to mention the other cases.
He described the most recent case and indicated that it wouldn't affect his ability to be a good juror. Then the next person was asked about their case. Then the question was asked of "anyone else".
In my brief experience in court, one lesson that my lawyer taught me was to honestly answer questions, but don't offer info not asked for. Mr. Hogan was never asked about additional court cases after he described the most recent one.
I understand now why Samsung tried to seal it.
I don't. Why would you want to seal that? It seams significant and a pretty cut and dried fact (according to the transcript). So why not be out loud about it? Are they trying to not hurt the feelings of the guy that lied, and potentially cost them $1B? Samsung has hurt my feelings in the past when I tried to get some tech support from them for the device I paid them money for.
Never let a mediocre career stand in the way of a good time
In reality at the time there was probably no issue and probably follow up questions showed he was reasonable. Just answering yes to a question like this does not necessarily disqualify anyone. If the potential juror said it would not effect his decision, a reasonable lawyer might take that into account. What this is is a bunch of lawyers who have lost a case they probably should not have lost trying to cover their asses and bill hours grasping at whatever straws hey can, throwing mud and seeing what sticks.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Because discussing the names of jurors is common dinner table conversation. The husband probably didn't even remember the 20 year old suit. Samsung was compelled to disclose the connection to the court after researching and finding the records.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
Why was this modded troll?
"Tongue tied and twisted, just an Earth bound misfit
Which is why the it's supposed to be a jury of your peers.
The case is Apple Inc. v. Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. I'd like to see Microsoft, Google, IBM, Sony, et al. in a jury box!
If corporations are persons, does that mean they're subject to subpoena?
Set your phasers on "funky"!
The problem with that is that according to the transcript he was asked a question over and above the "court instructions".
Where do you get that? It's not in the article or Samsung's brief, which merely states:
The jury foreman, Velvin Hogan, failed to answer truthfully during voir dire. Asked by the Court whether “you or a family member or someone very close to you [has] ever been involved in a lawsuit, either as a plaintiff, a defendant, or as a witness?” (Reporter’s Transcript (“RT”) 148:18-21), he disclosed one such lawsuit but failed to disclose two others, including one in which he was sued by his former employer, Seagate, for breach of contract after he failed to repay a promissory note (RT 148:22-150:12; Seagate Tech., Inc. v. Hogan, Case No. MS-93-0919 (Santa Cruz Mun. Ct. June 30, 1993), Declaration of Susan Estrich (“Estrich Decl.”) Ex. A), and filed for personal bankruptcy six months later (In re Velvin R. Hogan and Carol K. Hogan, Case No. 93-58291-MM (Bankr. N.D. Cal. Dec. 27, 1993); Estrich Decl., Ex. B).
It doesn't say anything there about court instructions, or additional questions beyond them. Do you have a different source?
In my brief experience in court, one lesson that my lawyer taught me was to honestly answer questions, but don't offer info not asked for.
Which, ironically, was something that Hogan probably learned from his attorney in his first two court cases that he failed to mention.
No. The lawyer who sued the foreman is the spouse of a partner in the same law firm. Nowhere in the published papers does it say whether the lawyer had any direct connection to this particular case.
It's marked troll because it's incorrect. Groklaw has the transcripts, he was asked if he was ever involved in any such lawsuits with no time constraints. 10 years was never mentioned or asked
See it for yourself: court transcript from Jury Selection
Court: The next question is, have you or a family member or someone very close to you ever been involved in a lawsuit, either as a plaintiff, a defendant, or as a vitness?
...
Prospective juror: In 2008, after my company went belly up, the programmer that worked for me filed a lawsuit against me
He goes on to give details of that case (which was settled out of court). He never disclosed the dispute with Seagate. But obviously, the court never said anything about not disclosing cases older than 10 years. So, he failed to disclose a very important case, probably because doing so would have meant that he couldn't have served in the jury, which he really much wanted (see TFA).
Guess what? He doesn't get to make that decision. The judge wanted to know ever? That's the judge's call. When it comes to jury selection, they get to decide what is relevant. Doesn't mean you'll be excluded, but they want to know.
For example I was in the pool for a marajuna case (way at the end, so unlikely I'd get on the jury) and the subject of criminal record came up. For employment they can ask about felonies in the last I believe 7 years. The court has wider latitude for juries. So one guy, he was probably 45 or 50, says ya I have a guilty plea for auto theft when I was 18. Judge asks more about it, it was a "young and stupid" kind of thing, his civil rights have been fully restored, and so on. He ended up being on the jury.
It is the kind of thing he wouldn't reveal to an employer, but the court got to ask. They weren't dicks about it, like I said he sat on the jury, but the judge gets to weigh it and make a decision.
So CPT Armchair Lawyer here doesn't get to decide how long they are allowed to ask about. If they asked ever, they get to ask ever.
Samsung was destroying emails and manipulating the discovery process.
http://internationaledisclosure.blogspot.com/2012/09/apple-v-samsung-largest-international.html
Here's what the judge had to say:
“Apple sought a finding that Samsung spoliated evidence, and as a sanction for such conduct, an adverse inference jury instruction “to the effect that: (1) Samsung had a duty to preserve relevant evidence, including emails; Samsung failed to preserve large volumes of relevant emails and other documents; Samsung acted in bad faith in failing to preserve the relevant documents; and the jury may presume that the documents that Samsung failed to preserve would have been favorable to Apple's case and unfavorable to Samsung; and (2) if the jury finds infringement of any Apple patent, trademark, or trade dress, that jury may infer that the infringement was intentional, willful, and without regard to Apple's rights.”
The jury was issued an Adverse Inference Instruction by the judge.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adverse_inference
Quote from Wikipedia:
"The United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit pointed out in 2004, in a case involving spoliation (destruction) of evidence, that "...the giving of an adverse inference instruction often terminates the litigation in that it is 'too difficult a hurdle' for the spoliating party to overcome. The court therefore concluded that the adverse inference instruction is an 'extreme' sanction that should 'not be given lightly'...".
Judge: "Assume Samsung is guilty. Feel free to be as impartial as you wish to be."
Jury: "Sweet. We'll be back in a few hours and can go home early."
The critical point in all of this is that Velvin Hogan's personal feelings were legally allowed to be part of the decision making process at that point. There is no misconduct.
bah, didn't see the post above yours. /. threading is horrid
Even better than a tweet, I've got an anonymous Slashdot post implicating that does business in Tehran.
People always whine about how courts seem to not want people with expertise in an area, and this is the reason. The jury is meant to be the judge of fact, not the judge of law (the judge is the judge of law). So the idea is they are given a set of evidence, and told what the law is and how to apply it, and then, in that context only, they are to decide what the facts show. They aren't to use outside information, they aren't to use their own supposed understanding. They consider the evidence presented and the law as instructed.
The whole idea is so you don't have an armchair lawyer with a hazy understanding of the law making bad decisions. You don't want someone who says "I'm an expert on this, listen to me," and turns out to be wrong, or motivated by something else.
The jury is not supposed to be an investigative force or anything. They are just supposed to judge the facts they are given in the context of the law they are instructed. Hence while you don't want people who are "stupid" in terms of low IQ, you do want people who do not have a background in the case. You want people who will consider things with an open mind, not come in assuming they know how things should go already.
You think a Lawyer knows every person that their spouse has sued in over 19 year career?
It was a yes or no question. He answered yes.
How is that not answering truthfully?
A better followup question would be" HOW MANY lawsuits have you been involved in, and with whom?"
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
EHHH - WRONG!!!
according to the transcript: "...have you or a family member or someone very close to you ever been involved in a lawsuit, either as a plaintiff, a defendant, or as a witness?" 'Ever' is not ten years.
There was no time limitation.
The asshole lied, plain and simple - care to change your tune now?
pshaw. Primary sources? Yeah, right I'll accept that when I'm dead. Get back to me when you've got a Wikipedia article or, preferably, a tweet.
It's not a real story until there's a tweet about the Wikipedia article, which is then read by some journalists who write a number of newspaper articles, and an editor comes back to the Wikipedia article and carefully cites the articles as sources.
I see you get your knowledge of this stuff from movies.
This was jury selection, not the trial. The judge was asking questions, not the attorneys. The juror is not on trial, and is not a witness. He is being asked simple, direct questions by the judge, for the purpose of seeing if there is anything that would disqualify him. The juror obviously knows this, and it is his responsibilty and duty to state any and all disqualifying information.
These things take long enough as it is. There is no reason to drag it out any further by treating every potential juror as some kind of hostile witness who needs to be thoroughy interrogated.
according to the transcript, if you had bother reading it, everyone was asked at the same time the question and asked to raise their hand, he raised his so they went to him for more detail, of which he only gave 1.
When you cant win, ad hominem.
That they then went to him for more information when he answered yes.
When you cant win, ad hominem.
A lie by omission is still a lie. It's amazing to me how you people try to rationalize this type of behavior.
--Jeremy
Jesus was a liberal
So now we get to have a new trial. However it won't be the same trial as they've already argued and received feedback about how persuasive their arguments were.
Would a retrial just play edited version (minus the struck/objection-sustained stuff) of video back to 12 people and get that jury's vote? It seems like it would be much less effort.
Slashdot's rate-of-post filter: Preventing you from posting too many great ideas at once.
It's more than that. It's 'you think a partner in a law firm looks over the names of potential jurors in a case she is not involved in just to see if the name of someone her husband sued 20 years ago pops up'?
The problem with that is that according to the transcript he was asked a question over and above the "court instructions". The court instructions refer to a form that potential jurors are asked to fill out. The transcript refers to a direct question asked during voir dire...It is also possible he either misunderstood the court instructions or flat out lied about them and that no such instruction was ever issued.
And therein lies the problem - - Samsung will never prove perjury and without a finding that he perjured himself, the judge isn't going to throw the case out. Absent perjury, you have what amounts to a procedural error and no judge is going to throw out a case this monumental over a minor procedural error. Samsung can appeal that, but it's equally unlikely that an appeals court will throw the case out because of a minor procedural error. More likely, they'll end up telling the Samsung lawyers, "next time, be more thorough during voir dire."
I swear to tell the truth, the WHOLE truth, and nothing but the truth.
Lies by omission are not permitted by this oath. It is contempt.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Hey Apple! Samsung wants their $1 billion back, with interest. Oh, and until the new trial is over, you can't sell phones in the US or Asia, and you have to "cease and desist" operating any network that allows those phones to operate until the new trial is over. Payback baby, its a bitch!
You do know where the judge gets the questions from, right?
I'll give you a hint. It's the lawyers.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
And the vast majority are saying:
That isn't an argument
Yes it is
No it isn't
'Tis
'Tisn't ...
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
The adverse inference instruction was removed because Apple was also responsible for gaming the discovery process, and rather than having the jury instructions include an adverse inference instruction for BOTH Apple and Samsung or NONE at all, Apple's lawyer consented to none at all. In particular, Apple, as the plaintiff, should have known well before Samsung when litigation was anticipated, and yet they still didn't put a litigation hold on Steve Jobs correspondence.
The jury never found out that Apple and Samsung gamed the discovery process.
This was jury selection, not the trial. ... The juror obviously knows this, and it is his responsibilty and duty to state any and all disqualifying information.
False. Us mere mortals are not lawyers. Jurors are not capable of determining what qualifies as "any and all disqualifying information". We can only answer the questions we have been asked.
Jury questions often have all-inclusive questions such as, "Is there any reason that you can't judge this case fairly and impartially?"
However, a juror's opinion of "any and all disqualifying information" might be very different from a judge or lawyer. That's why jurors get asked more specific questions to determine if they should be dismissed from a case for cause.
Further, plaintiffs & defendants get peremptory challenges where they can reject a juror without cause (ie, suspected but unprovable bias).
Yeah, if you're a witness.
The JUROR's oath states something like they will give a true verdict according to the evidence.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
It was a yes or no question. He answered yes.
No, he did not answer "yes." This is from the transcript of the voir dire:
See what he did there? Instead of saying "yes," he answered as if that were the only case. By omitting the other two cases he was involved in, he effectively misrepresented that this was the only case. I'm sorry, but it is extremely foreseeable that being sued by Seagate is a material fact that should have been disclosed. He also lied later in this exchange:
He said months ago that his own experiences relating to patents helped him decide how he should rule, and then he proceeded to "help" other jurors understand based on that information--NOT the judge's instruction. And his statements since have indicated that he was going out of his way to be on this jury so that he could be a part of this big case.
It all looks pretty straight-forward to me. The guy borrowed $25,000 from Seagate in 1991, didn't pay it back, got sued, declared bankruptcy to dodge his financial obligation, and apparently still is buttsore about it. In 2012, he had an ax to grind against Seagate, he hid relevant information to get on the jury so that he could grind it, and then he proceeded to trash Samsung--the currently majority owners of Seagate--to get back at them. And now he's going out to the press and lying about the questions and instructions to not look like the tool he is.
I hope they nail his ass to the wall for juror misconduct and that Samsung gets an actual fair and impartial trial out of it.
He had a number of peculiar ideas about patents. Maybe he had peculiar ideas about the jury selection process too, and thought it there was a 10-year limit or something.
xkcd is not in the sudoers file. This incident will be reported.
In my brief experience in court, one lesson that my lawyer taught me was to honestly answer questions, but don't offer info not asked for.
True, if you are a witness or defendant in a case. Not a friggin' potential juror. Why can't people make the distinction here? This guy is was not on trial (yet).
He answered yes by raising his hand.
He then volunteered ONE example. He was not asked to disclose all cases. He did not misrepresent anything. He did not state he only had one lawsuit, or answer any questions as to how many lawsuits he had been involved in.
That's not his fault for those questions not being asked.
As for the other part, yeah, that's probably where they'll nail him. However, his a-ha moment was described to a journalist, not any court member.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
Mistrial as a result of a juror's failure to disclose pertinent information is a bit of a long short. The courts do not like to overturn jury decisions.
However to be clear, it was not Samsung or Apple who were asking questions it was the judge. When Mr. Hogan answered questions about his 2008 law suit, but failed to disclose his other law suits, Judge Koh should have asked if there were any other cases, but failed to do so. The judge's failure to probe deeper and Mr. Hogan's failure to fully disclose his past should not be held against Samsung. Samsung doesn't have to prove perjury (which would be difficult as Mr. Hogan's answers were factual, but incomplete), only jury misconduct. My understanding (IANAL) is that the standard for jury misconduct is much lower - innocently answering questions wrongly can result in misconduct. However even if misconduct is shown, Samsung has to prove that the misconduct resulted in a bias. Bias is harder to prove however Mr. Hogan's post-trial statements seem to indicate such bias. He said the trial was the "highlight of my career - my life even" and that he wanted to "send a message to the industry at large that patent infringing is not the right thing to do". Sounds a lot like bias to me.
Samsung has a much stronger case for bias and misconduct involving Mr. Hogan on the claim that he ignored the Judge's instructions to the jury, relied on his own understanding of patent laws, and used his position as jury foreman to convince the jury to rule in favour of Apple. Jurors are not expected to be a clean slate, with NO outside knowledge or experience, however they ARE expected to weigh the evidence presented in the case and the legal issues as explained by the judge. If they have external expertise, they are NOT to use this to persuade or convince other jurors. In post-trial interviews, Mr. Hogan said that he explained to the rest of the jury the standards (his own) for infringement of design patents, functional patents and prior art. This is really the smoking gun. Jurors are supposed to deliberate on the evidence and the points of law as explained in the jury instructions. They are not supposed to conduct their own research (either on evidence or law), experiments, re-enactments, visit the scene of the crime, seek outside evidence, etc. and if they have outside information they MAY NOT share it with other jurors.
If you aren't part of the solution, then there is good money to be made prolonging the problem
It's not Samsung's lawyers that ask the questions, but the judge.
If you aren't part of the solution, then there is good money to be made prolonging the problem
Samsung didn't let him into the trial--everyone let him in (and I would think samsung would have preferred a juror without a chip on his shoulder to a possible excuse for a new trial).
Bottles.
Should have seen this coming; judging by the name, I'm pretty sure he's a Star Trek villan.
Perhaps, and no, I'm not saying this is true or it did happen, but perhaps he had to fill out a generic jury questionnaire before being considered and it was limited to 10 years and he thought that was what the judge was asking about?
I've had to fill one out in the past when I was considered for a jury. I don't remember what was on it, but it was basic background information. And no, i didn't make it onto a jury so i likely did something wright.
I hope they nail his ass to the wall for juror misconduct and that Samsung gets an actual fair and impartial trial out of it.
After the Billion-Dollar ruling against Samsung last time, good luck finding a jury of 12 people who haven't heard about the case and had a chance to form an opinion about it. Even my grandmother, who suffers from Alzheimer's, asked me about it last time I saw her.
In voir dire, failing to answer completely is the same thing as not answering truthfully. It is a lie of omission because he was asked to fully elaborate, not cherry pick the lawsuit(s) that had no bearing on the trial while omitting the one(s) which did.
You are always asked if you were involved in lawsuits against a company. He would have been given a list of companies that Samsung has stock in or owns in part or in whole and if any of them he had 'bad feelings' against any of those companies. It is how I got out of jury duty because one of the companies was a company I did consulting at. You have to disclose that information otherwise you have a conflict of interest.
Only 'flamers' flame!
He wasn't asked for an example, he was asked to explain why he raised his hand. Absent the case he presented, he still would've been required to answer in the affirmative, which means his answer was not a full and complete answer, an expectation which is made clear during voir dire. If that expectation was not made clear by the judge, there were other procedural errors.
In some parts of the law, the knowing party HAS to disclose to the unknowing party, even if the unknowing party doesn't ask. I can't say that that's the case in jury selection, but I'd be surprised if it wasn't. So yes, he could very well have misrepresented.
I can mend the break of day, heal a broken heart, and provide temporary relief to nymphomaniacs.
Trolly troll troll. He ignored prior art because of a notion he invented himself that prior art has to be "interchangeable". He influenced the jury to disregard prior art against Apple's patents because the prior art didn't run on iOS. That he was biased against Samsung is pretty obvious from the fact that he didn't also apply this (completely wrong) notion of "interchangeability" to Samsung's supposedly infringing software. If it has to run on iOS to be prior art, why doesn't it have to run on iOS to be infringing?
This.
"With regards to the Seagate suit and subsequent bankruptcy, Hogan says the court required jurors to disclose any litigation they were involved in within the last 10 years -- which he did. The 1993 Seagate business fell well outside that time range."
That's what this Hogan guys says, but there was no 10 year limit. He made that up. The exact question the judge asked was:
THE COURT: Okay. Welcome back. Please take a seat. We had a few more departures in your absence. Let's continue with the questions. The next question is, have you or a family member or someone very close to you ever been involved in a lawsuit, either as a plaintiff, a defendant, or as a witness?
That's why they have transcripts, you know.
___
If you think big enough, you'll never have to do it.
What I meant was: If corporations are persons in that they can sue and be sued, can they also be summoned to jury duty as "peers" of the litigants?
Set your phasers on "funky"!
Jury nullification.
The jury is the judge of guilt.
That involves two parts. Judging the facts, and judging the law.
Please take your revisionist interpretation elsewhere.
But didn't ask him to provide ALL specifics. or even how many lawsuits he was involved with.
Don't know why he should be held accountable for those questions not being asked.
A transcript doesn't show everything that's germane to this debate. There's also the issue of timing, as in the flow of the conversation; the cadence of the "back and forth".
It's one thing if the judge asks a question, he gives his first answer, and then she immediately moves onto the next juror. In that case, he would have to interrupt a judge sitting on the bench while she's talking. I can understand him keeping quiet; I don't think I'd have the balls to interrupt a judge in court.
It's a whole other thing if, after he describes his first lawsuit, he pauses (and pauses) without saying anything, inviting the judge to think he was done talking. It's hard to make the "he answered what was asked of him" argument when everyone is sitting there waiting for him to keep talking. In that case, you have to conclude that he has made a conscious decision to withhold the details about his Seagate lawsuit.
Unfortunately this is something that, without a video or audio feed, just can't be settled.
Have you ever been in Jury selection? While the judge asks preliminary general questions that may disqualify, the lawyers most definitely get to ask questions directly to the potential jurists as well as ask followup questions, and they are each allowed to eliminate a certain number for any reason they want.
I was almost selected as a jurist for an attempted murder trial involving a firearm so the judge asked if we owned guns, were a member of NRA, related to people that are police or lawyers. When I answered some of those in the affirmative, the prosecutor then asked some follow up questions. Granted this was for a state criminal case and the Apple/Samsung was federal civil suit.
I hope they nail his ass to the wall for juror misconduct and that Samsung gets an actual fair and impartial trial out of it.
After the Billion-Dollar ruling against Samsung last time, good luck finding a jury of 12 people who haven't heard about the case and had a chance to form an opinion about it. Even my grandmother, who suffers from Alzheimer's, asked me about it last time I saw her.
I'm pretty sure 98% of the general public doesn't give a rats ass which soulless megacorp wins this fight and thus they have not been following it with even a fraction of the attention they lavish on their favourite reality shows. The only people who care about this lawsuit are geeks, lawyers and possibly a few "business analysts".
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
he was asked to fully elaborate
Bullshit.
Stop making things up. Go read the proceedings on groklaw.
What the judge said is "All right, let's go to Mr. Hogan". You are trying to say "Mr. Hogan didn't have to say anything because that's not a question, the judge just said 'let's go' and that means nothing!" However, standard voir dire instructions are that when you raise your hand and it is "your turn", you must explain your answer in "narrative form". So the reason he gave an example is not because he volunteered an example without prompting. It was because he was instructed that, when picked by the judge, he must elaborate on his yes/no answer. To repeat that, he was required to explain his answer. The judge did not vocalize that requirement at that time, because it was part of the previous instructions. That's why all of the people who raised their hand were not asked explicitly to elaborate, but they all did when he called their names. Since he was, in fact, instructed to explain, he was required to answer truthfully. Omissions are considered deceit as far as the court is concerned.
ASCII stupid question, get a stupid ANSI
In my experience the lawyers have input, and have say who is on the jury.
Well, sure. But this would not have been an 'additional' question, it would have been the SAME question that the judge already asked. It's not like the guy gave some hint that there was more and the judge missed it.
I am guessing that the 'have you ever been involved in a lawsuit' question gets asked in every single civil trial. Nobody wants to waste time in every jury selection reasking questions that have already been asked and should have been answered completely.
Furthermore, the guy now claims that they were asking for a 'ten year period'. So even if a lawyer re-asked the question, or said 'are there any more cases' the guy would still have answered no.
Having been through jury selection in both, state and federal court have different procedures. Indeed, from what I'm reading about the trial, it appears that different federal circuits or courts may have different procedures, since what was done here doesn't match what was done when I went through federal jury selection (or they've changed the procedure).
First, it's called a lie of omission.
Second, the judge did the questioning, not the lawyers. They get to agree to jury questions, but the judge actually asks them, as you can see from the transcript.
Third, he never answered "yes", rather he gave one example and failed to give the others. Again, please examine the transcript and note that, when he was also asked, "Anything about that experience that would affect your ability to be fair and impartial to both sides in this case?" to which he answered "I don't believe so." This, in spite of being involved in a personal bankruptcy that cost him his house due to litigation by a company owned by Samsung.
Fourth, the failure to disclose it, no matter whose fault it may be, robbed Samsung of their legal rights. As such, they should be entitled to a new trial.
You mean adverse inference, not inverse. One is a legal term, the other is... not. Adverse inference means that they assume something is being covered up. Inverse would mean that you infer the opposite. But you'd have to have evidence and the whole problem that gives rise to adverse inference is that someone has destroyed or lost relevant information for whatever reason, leaving you with no evidence. Which is why there's no such thing as "inverse inference."
M-CAM called this in August...to learn more about Velvin Hogan’s erroneous actions, check out the Patently Obvious report entitled, “In the jury of the blind, Velvin Hogan is King”: http://www.bit.ly/Ru6z6q
I did. While the word "fully" was not spoken, neither was the word "truthfully." That's because both are expectations made clear prior to the questioning during voir dire.
Your statement of "bullshit" is as accurate applied to this as it would be if I had said "he was asked to truthfully elaborate." That is, only in the most pedantically technical way, completely disregarding the context of the situation. The failure to use the term in each question does not in any way mean that it does not apply to each question.
For everyone interested, here it is.
And if Alice didn't ask how often or over how many years or ANY qualifying question, then Alice is an idiot.
He had a number of peculiar ideas about patents. Maybe he had peculiar ideas about the jury selection process too, and thought it there was a 10-year limit or something.
And peculiar ideas about honesty. And peculiar ideas about integrity. And peculiar ideas about the rule of law.
It's looking to me more and more that this loose cannon just pulled off a chainsaw massacre of Apple's case.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
He answered yes - to a yes or no question
True, he was then individually asked by the judge, because he said yes, what cases he has been involved in.
Read the transcripts
Troll != disagree
It seems like he's genuinely misinformed rather than trolling.
After the Billion-Dollar ruling against Samsung last time, good luck finding a jury of 12 people who haven't heard about the case and had a chance to form an opinion about it. Even my grandmother, who suffers from Alzheimer's, asked me about it last time I saw her.
Almost every woman who shows up in my Facebook feed (and several of the men) have no clue about this lawsuit. That's not what they talk about, they talk about how far they ran yesterday, what they're going to eat, and where they're going out drinking. The majority of women I know don't care about either technology or lawsuits, let alone both at the same time.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
I am aware of that
He has or had multiple conflicts of interest that he did not disclose. Samsung has made light of these in their request for a new trial
Go look it up. Juries have the ability to nullify on account of an innocent verdict being un-reviewable. The prohibition against double jeopardy means that once someone has been found innocent it is done, no further review. They do not have the power as a specific matter of law.
Judges technically have a nullification power too for the same reason. If a judge dismisses a case after it has come to trial, it is done. As soon as it goes to trial, jeopardy applies, no retrial.
Go read up on the actual way the law works.
Surely there would be a database somewhere of court cases and who was involved in them, either as witnesses, plaintiff or defendant. Even if it is only for court cases in America. Surely the system should automatically scan anyone called up to be a witness and show any prior cases for all to see?
Ryans Tutorials - A collection of technology tutorials.
Lawyers have a massive hardon for plain old paper. There's also the matter of jurisdiction and court authority, not to mention the courts which don't use common law. I can see something like that existing within certain courts, but not nation wide.
The jury foreman said the judge only asked for ten years, but the transcripts (reproduced on Groklaw) clearly show that he was asked if he was ever involved in a lawsuit. The original poster wasn't trolling, but he wasn't careful reading the article either.
===== Murphy's Law is recursive. =====
> They have to prove he lied. He answered yes to a yes or no question. Truthfully.
He didn't use "yes" or "no" in that answer (in spite of your repeated assertions to the contrary, which have been proven incorrect by the official transcript). And in spite of his claims of a 10 year time limit, no evidence thereof has been found in the transcript. Rather, we have evidence that another juror mentioned a case from more than 10 years ago.
This kind of lie is called a "lie of omission." He was asked if he had "ever" been part of a case. Inexplicably leaving out a judgment that led to personal bankruptcy and the loss of his house is quite an omission.
Here's the oath for voire dire in California.
Would you like me to look up "lie of omission" for you next?
Yup. The real irony is that the cost to just roll out a single system across the entire country would not be that large. You're just talking about a fairly simple database with the ability to store transcripts and other attachments. Half the courts have already rolled out such systems, and picking the best one and extending it to other courts would likely be simple.
I think that the main thing preventing it is all the companies that make a fortune off of building their own private databases of all this info.
The jury is meant to be the judge of fact, not the judge of law (the judge is the judge of law).
Why is that, anyway? Facts are complex things, and difficult for a layperson to interpret: I wouldn't want anyone interpreting evidence from genetic testing without a basic education in probability, for example. But the law is supposed to be simple enough that citizens can follow it. If a jury of one's peers can't reliably interpret the meaning of the law, how can the defendant be expected to do so?
He was fired by Seagate, and his employment contract specified that they would loan him money (for moving expenses, i.e. to buy a house) but if his employment was terminated he would have to pay that money back. They sued him for that money, to enforce the contract. I don't know if he paid it or not, but he declared bankruptcy a few months afterwards.
Those two cases -- being sued by Seagate, and his personal bankruptcy -- were the two he did not mention in voir dire for Apple v. Samsung. And this was all 20ish years ago (IIRC he was hired in 1989, and fired in 1991).
He lied by omission.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lie#Lying_by_omission
That's what this Hogan guys says, but there was no 10 year limit. He made that up.
So he lied once, and now he's lying about the fact that he lied? At least he's consistent.
> Here's what the Samsung lawyers should've asked him after he raised his hand.
The judge does the questioning based on a list of questions both parties agree to beforehand. Samsung's lawyers weren't asking the questions. Mr. Hogan lied by omission, failing to mention the other, more relevant cases. Then lied about his reasons for doing that in a media interview (there was no "10 year" cutoff), proving that he both remembered and withheld that information deliberately.
Was he also an apple fan boy?
OK