Just yesterday we reported that Apple has asked for an emergency sanction against Samsung for leaking inadmissible evidence to the press. It is now clear what Apple want this sanction to be. Apple wants Judge Koh to rule in their favour with regards to the design patent claims.
Mueller of FossPatent reports:
Apple argues that monetary sanctions are not enough for such an attempt to influence the jury and apparently didn’t deter Samsung’s conduct before: the Korean electronics giant has already been sanctioned four times in this litigation, most recently for destroying evidence. Apple proposes a couple of alternative sanctions:
Ideally, Apple wants “judgment in [its] favor […] on its claim that Samsung infringes Apple’s phone design patents, and […] that those patents are not invalid”. In that case, Samsung would potentially face a billion-dollar damages bill, most of which would be a disgorgement of infringer’s profits. The jury would still have to establish liability with respect to Apple’s three software patents-in-suit and its two trade dresses, but liability with respect to the four design patents-in-suit would be determined by the court.
Apple is well aware of how drastic a sanction this would be, but it believes that it would be justified by the extraordinary circumstances:
“The proper remedy for Samsung’s misconduct is judgment that Apple’s asserted phone design patents are valid and infringed. Through its extraordinary actions yesterday, Samsung sought to sway the jury on the design patent issues, and the proper remedy is to enter judgment against Samsung on those same patents. It would be, to be sure, a significant sanction. But serious misconduct can only be cured through a serious sanction—and here, Samsung’s continuing and escalating misconduct merits a severe penalty that will establish that Samsung is not above the law.”
Mueller coninues, “Even if the court found that the appropriate sanction is a jury instruction that falls short of Apple’s second (softer) proposal, Samsung would still have a major problem. Apple has already won one adverse inference jury instruction. The question is how trusthworthy Samsung is going to appear to the jury if another sanction becomes known to it.”
Source: FossPatent
