

Judge denies Apple motion for Samsung injunction, tosses jury misconduct claims - ghshephard
http://appleinsider.com/articles/12/12/17/judge-denies-apple-motion-for-samsung-injunction-tosses-jury-misconduct-claims

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cageface
This has to be considered an overall win for Samsung. The fine hurts a bit but
an indefinite ban on those products would be a disaster.

Maybe Apple will take a hint and focus their energies on doing something
interesting in iOS 7 instead of barking through the fence at every competitor
that walks by.

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eridius
I didn't realize Apple's legal team was comprised of developers who could
otherwise be spending their time working on the OS.

~~~
drh
They aren't, but it still affects the decision makers at the top who are
supposed to be driving the vision of the company.

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pfedor
Not to mention, they presumably need to get paid.

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jacquesm
This should have been tried before a different judge. The jury misconduct
claims also reflect on judge Koh, she has a stake in letting her old verdict
stand.

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taligent
How does the jury misconduct claims reflect badly on Judge Koh ?

She didn't pick the jury. Samsung's and Apple's lawyers did.

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jacquesm
Her ruling apparently was that there was no misconduct. Normally when there is
jury misconduct a mistrial is declared, no matter who picked the jury.

Jury misconduct has nothing to do with who picked them but everything with
having a fair trial.

So for Judge Koh to declare that there was no jury misconduct here means that
she's essentially saying that she did her job well by not declaring a
mistrial. But with the statements made by some of the jurors it is not all
that evident that there was no jury misconduct and it should (imo) have been
another judge to confirm that, not judge Koh.

~~~
Tyrannosaurs
Unless I've misunderstood there's no suggestion she acted improperly during
the trial - the information that suggests the foreman was essentially biased
based on his previous experiences only came up after the trial.

At that point Koh is essentially in the same position as the rest of us - she
has to judge the information now available to her which she's done and
evidently decided it's not an issue.

But she has nothing to be defensive about and I see no reason why another
judge would need to look at it. She could declare a mistrial without it
looking bad on her in any way at all.

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ars
So basically what the judge is saying is that there was jury misconduct, but
due to a technicality Samsung can't prove it?

And from this companies are fined $1 billion?

~~~
lgg
No she didn't. What she said is that the statements Samsung used in its motion
were inadmissible. She did not express any opinion on whether those statements
would have constituted jury misconduct if they were admissible.

"In sum, the integrity of the jury system and the Federal Rules of Evidence
demand that the Court not consider Mr. Hogan’s post-verdict statements
concerning the jury’s decision-making process. None of the cases Samsung cites
suggests otherwise. Because the Court cannot consider these inadmissible
statements in determining whether to hold an evidentiary hearing, there is no
evidence properly before the Court to require such a hearing. Instead, the
Court must apply the well established presumption that the jury followed the
law."

~~~
ars
Yah I read that. But no judge uses a technicality if they can dismiss on more
concrete grounds.

Sounds to me like she agreed with Samsung, but the technicality forced her to
go a different way.

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eridius
Why would any judge even bother to dismiss on the grounds that the statements
were not sufficient evidence, when the statements are not even admissible? It
seems to me to be a bad idea to have judges going around saying "if this
evidence _were_ admissible then it would win you the motion/case/whatever".

~~~
ars
Which of course is why she didn't say it.

A Judge will often do something like: It's wrong because of X, but even if X
doesn't apply then it's still wrong because of Y.

It's telling that she didn't do that here. (Unless she did and the article
just doesn't mention it.)

For example (from this same ruling):

> U.S District Judge Lucy Koh noted that Samsung claims to have "worked
> around" using different technology than the Apple patents found to have been
> infringed such as the iPhone's popular "pinch to zoom" feature.

> And even if that's a false claim, the judge ruled, Apple's demands to yank
> the Samsung products from U.S. shelves and bar future sales was too broad of
> a punishment in devices built with technology backed by hundreds of patents
> each.

Quoted from: [http://bigstory.ap.org/article/judge-denies-apple-request-
ba...](http://bigstory.ap.org/article/judge-denies-apple-request-ban-samsung-
phones)

~~~
eridius
I don't think that's analogous. In your quoted example, if the judge left it
at just the "because of X", then someone could come along and say "here's why
X doesn't apply", and she'd have to revisit it. But this way she's saying
"even if you disprove X, my ruling stands because of Y".

However, in the case of inadmissible evidence, it seems there's no risk of
someone coming along and saying "but it is admissible after all", because it's
pretty clear that it's not.

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chris_wot
Can't help it... but not very copyediting...

"Judge Koh noted that it would not be in the public's best interest if
consumers to deprive them the right to buy Samsung products when only a
limited number of features were found to be infringement."

Argh!

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ampersandy
"but not very copyediting"?

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Tyrannosaurs
I think that's not very copyediting either.

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chris_wot
iPad. I'm not a professional editor. Mock me as you will.

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Tyrannosaurs
No offence meant, only intended as the gentlest of mockery.

~~~
chris_wot
:-)

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greggman
I'm really curious just what evidence is required to consider jury misconduct.
Statements from a juror themselves seem like about the best evidence possible.
Maybe others with more experience can shed some light?

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Goranek
patents are destroying technology

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dfa1979
So is corporate theft.

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Drakim
corporate theft is a real thing, but it can hardly be called corporate theft
when things like round corners, big colorful icons, are the thing being
"stolen". Apple is not protecting their brand, they are using the law as a
weapon against their rivals.

~~~
Goranek
I agree 100% with you. Patents are ok, but not idiotic ones like (rounded
corners)

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ewillbefull
What happened with the profit margin disclosures that were appealed by Apple?

