Case Summaries

Intellectual Property

[02/01] Thorner v. Sony Computer Entertainment America LLC
In a patent infringement action concerning a patent relating to a tactile feedback system for computer video games, the district court's judgment of noninfringement upon stipulation is vacated and the case remanded, where: 1) the district court improperly limited the term "attached to said pad" to mean attachment only to an external surface, and the parties based the stipulation of noninfringement on the district court's erroneous construction of this claim; and 2) the district court erred in its construction of the term "flexible."

[01/27] Krippelz v. Ford Motor Co.
In a patent infringement case involving a vehicle-mounted lamp, the district court's denial of the defendant's motion for judgment as a matter of law on invalidity is reversed, its summary judgment of infringement is vacated, and the case is remanded for entry of judgment of nonliability for the defendant, where the district court committed reversible error in its holdings that: 1) a reasonable jury could find that a competing French patent failed to teach the required "conical beam of light;" and 2) the jury could have reasonably found the French patent to lack a lamp "adjacent to the window."

[01/23] Falana v. Kent State University
In a suit against a university and inventors listed on a patent alleging that the plaintiff was an omitted co-inventor, the district court’s judgment in favor of the plaintiff as to inventorship is affirmed, where: 1) the district court did not err in construing the language of the claims; 2) error in the exclusion of certain exhibits did not result in substantial injustice and was harmless error; 3) the district court did not err in concluding that the plaintiff's contribution of the method used by the team of which he was a part for making the claimed compounds was enough of a contribution to conception to pass the threshold required for joint inventorship; and 4) the district court's exceptional case finding and award of attorney fees were not yet final and not properly before the court of appeals.

[01/20] Dealertrack, Inc. v. Huber
In a patent infringement action involving patents directed to a computer-aided method and system for processing credit applications over electronic networks, the district court's rulings on summary judgment motions are affirmed in part, vacated in part, reversed in part, and the case remanded, where: 1) the district court erred in granting summary judgment of noninfringement based on a construction of "communications medium" that carved out the Internet; 2) the court modified the claim constructions of "communications medium" and "central processing means," requiring it to vacate summary judgment of noninfringement and remand to the district court to determine infringement in the first instance applying the new constructions; 3) the district court legally erred in denying a motion for summary judgment of invalidity of certain claims for indefiniteness; 4) the district court correctly found that certain claims were patent ineligible abstract ideas.

[01/19] Washington State Republican Party v. Washington State Grange
In a suit involving the State of Washington's "top-two" primary election system, the district court's order granting the state's request for reimbursement of attorney's fees is reversed, and its summary judgment dismissal of the plaintiff's claims in other respects is affirmed, where: 1) the state showed that its primary system furthered an important regulatory interest in providing voters with relevant information about the candidates on the ballots, so as to defeat the plaintiffs' as-applied freedom of association claims; 2) the state's primary system did not violate its fundamental right of access to the ballot by making it difficult for a minor-party candidates to qualify for the general election ballot; 3) a plaintiff did not explain how the state infringed its trademark in connection with the provision of competing services; 4) a written settlement definitively resolved the state's liability for attorney's fees; 5) the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying leave to amend the complaint to add a new claim; 6) the plaintiffs waived a claim concerning compelled speech because it was not included in any complaint; and 7) the primary system was severable from an unconstitutional provision of the same enacting legislation.

More...

Insurance Law

[02/03] Pennsylvania National Mutual Casualty Insurance Co. v. Roberts
In a suit brought by an insurer seeking a declaratory judgment that it was required to indemnify its insured for no more than 40 percent of a state court judgment because it had covered its insured for no more than 40 percent of the time in which the state court plaintiff was exposed to lead poisoning, the district court's judgment is: 1) affirmed in part, where it was correct in allocating the insurer's liability using the pro-rata time on-the-risk, and its decision to use the plaintiff's date of birth as the starting point for the period in which she was exposed to lead poisoning was sound; and 2) reversed in part, where the district court erred in holding the insurer liable for 24 months of coverage rather than 22, since under the insurance contract, coverage ended when the property was sold.

[02/03] Scandinavian Reinsurance Co. Ltd. v. Saint Paul Fire and Marine Insurance Co.
The district court's grant of a petition to vacate an arbitral award is reversed, and on remand the district court is instructed to grant a cross-petition to confirm the award, where there was insufficient evidence before the district court on which to base a finding of "evident partiality" within the meaning of the Federal Arbitration Act despite the failure of two arbitrators to disclose their concurrent service as arbitrators in another, arguably similar, arbitration.

[01/30] M & F Fishing, Inc. v. Sea-Pac Insurance Managers, Inc.
In an action by owners and operators of commercial fishing companies alleging violations of the Unfair Competition Law predicated on violations of the Insurance Code, the judgment in favor of the plaintiffs is reversed and the matter is remanded, where: 1) the plaintiffs were not entitled to restitution for insurance lawfully placed from admitted carriers; 2) the plaintiffs were not entitled to restitution of premiums paid for nonadmitted coverage; 3) the plaintiffs were barred from recovering restitution of any broker fees based on a violation of Insurance Code section 1764.1 occurring more than four years before they filed suit; 4) the trial court should have granted one defendant's motion for nonsuit for lack of an agency relationship; 5) the trial court properly exercised its discretion when it denied the plaintiffs' motions to amend to add additional parties; and 6) the plaintiffs' entitlement to prejudgment interest was subject to the discretion of the trial court.

[01/27] Hutcherson v. Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System Administration
In a declaratory judgment action seeking a declaration that Arizona's Medicaid agency had no right at all to recover from an annuity purchased by a husband so that his institutionalized wife could obtain Medicaid coverage or, alternatively, had no right to recover for any costs incurred for the wife's care after the husband's death, the district court's grant of the defendant's motion for summary judgment is affirmed, where: 1) the federal Medicaid Act allows states to reach a deceased community spouse's annuity for costs incurred on behalf of an institutionalized spouse; and 2) nothing in the language of the Act was inconsistent with permitting the state agency to recover from the annuity expenses incurred after the husband's death.

[01/26] Lopez & Medina Corp. v. Marsh USA, Inc.
On appeal of a rejected cross-motion for summary judgment that argued that an insurance policy's coverage expressly applied to an airline's underlying claims for damages arising from the insured's failure to provide air transportation, as contractually required, to the airline's passengers, the district court's order denying the motion is affirmed, as the phrase "legally obligated to pay as damages" in a commercial general liability policy, which usually covers only tort claims, does not also provide coverage for claims in an underlying action arising out of and related to a contract between the parties.

More...

Environmental Law

[02/03] Pacific Rivers Council v. US Forest Service
In a suit challenging Forest Service amendments to the Sierra Nevada Forest Plan as inconsistent with the National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA) and the Administrative Procedure Act, the district court's grant of summary judgment to the Forest Service is: 1) reversed in part, where the plaintiff had Article III standing, and the failure of the environmental impact statement (EIS) to provide any analysis of the environmental consequences on individual fish species was a failure to comply with the hard look requirement of NEPA; and 2) affirmed in part, insofar as the Forest Service did take a hard look at environmental consequences on amphibians in the EIS, in compliance with NEPA.

[01/26] Chevron Corp. v. Naranjo
In a case in which a potential judgment-debtor sought a global anti-enforcement injunction against defendants from the Lago Agrio region of the Ecuadorian Amazon, prohibiting them from attempting to enforce an allegedly fraudulent judgment entered by an Ecuadorian court, the district court's grant of the injunction is reversed with orders to dismiss the claim, where the district court erred in construing New York’s Uniform Foreign Country Money-Judgments Recognition Act to grant the putative judgment-debtors a cause of action to challenge foreign judgments before enforcement of those judgments was sought.

[01/20] Sierra Club v. EPA
On petition brought by several environmental groups for review of the Environmental Protection Agency’s approval of the 2004 State Implementation Plan (SIP) for the San Joaquin Valley’s nonattainment area for the one-hour ozone National Ambient Air Quality Standard, the petition is granted with remand where the agency’s action in approving the challenged SIP in 2010 based on data current only as of 2004 was arbitrary and capricious under the Administrative Procedures Act.

[01/20] Center for Sierra Nevada Conservation v. County of El Dorado
In a case arising from the County of El Dorado's adoption of an oak woodland management plan and mitigation fee program without an environmental impact report (EIR), the district court's judgment in favor of the county is reversed, where: 1) the county could not rely on an earlier program EIR for its conclusion that the adoption of the plan and fee program would have no greater adverse environmental effect than that already anticipated in the program EIR, and its adoption of a negative declaration; and 2) the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) required a tiered EIR to be conducted prior to the county's adoption of the plan and fee program.

[01/19] Montana Sulphur and Chemical Company v. US Environmental Protection Agency
In consolidated cases challenging the propriety of various actions taken by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under the Clean Air Act with respect to Montana air quality, petitions for review of the agency actions are denied, where the EPA did not act arbitrarily or capriciously or abuse its discretion by making a State Implementation Plan (SIP) Call that preceded a formal revision of the SIP governing sulfur dioxide emissions, by disapproving portions of the revised SIP, or by promulgating the requirements set forth in the Federal Implementation Plan for sulfur dioxide emissions.

More...

Commercial Law

[02/01] In re American Express Merchants' Litigation
In a class action asserting Sherman Act claims, brought against a charge card issuer whose card acceptance agreement purported to preclude a merchant from bringing a class action lawsuit, the district court's grant of the defendant's motion to compel arbitration and dismissal of the case is reversed, where the cost of plaintiffs' individually arbitrating their dispute with the defendant would be prohibitive, effectively depriving them of the statutory protections of the antitrust laws, and thus the class action waiver in the arbitration provision was unenforceable.

[01/27] C9 Ventures v. SVC-West, L.P.
In a personal injury suit in which a lessor of helium-filled tanks used to inflate festive balloons cross-complained against the lessee to enforce an indemnification provision on the back of an unsigned invoice, the trial court's judgment in favor of the lessor and award of attorney fees to it is reversed, where: 1) the lessee did not manifest assent to the terms on the back of the unsigned invoice by course of dealing or course of performance, or under basic contract law; 2) the lessee did not sign the invoice or otherwise expressly agree to its terms; 3) an unsigned invoice itself is not a contract, and repeated delivery of a particular form does not make the form part of the parties' agreement; 4) payment of the invoice merely constituted the lessee's performance of the obligation under the oral contract to pay for the rental of the helium-filled tanks; and 5) assuming the transaction was a sale of goods covered by division 2 of the California Commercial Code, the indemnification provision was not an additional term of the contract under section 2207 of the Commercial Code.

[01/24] Long v. Tommy Hilfiger U.S.A. Inc.
In a putative class action against a men's clothing retailer alleging that its printing of “EXPIRY: 04/##” on a credit card receipt willfully violated the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act (FACTA)'s prohibition against printing the expiration date of the a credit card upon any receipt provided to the cardholder at the point of the sale, the district court's grant of the defendant's motion to dismiss is affirmed, where: 1) FACTA prohibits a merchant from printing expiration date information on a receipt provided to the consumer, even if the year is redacted; but 2) the defendant's interpretation of FACTA, although erroneous, was at least objectively reasonable, and thus there was no "willful" violation that could support a claim.

[01/24] Mabey Bridge & Shore, Inc. v. Schoch
In a suit by a corporation engaged in the business of supplying temporary steel bridges for construction projects, seeking a declaration that the Pennsylvania Steel Products Procurement Act, as interpreted and enforced by the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT), is unconstitutional, and requesting a preliminary and permanent injunction enjoining PennDOT from prohibiting the use of the company's temporary bridges on its projects, the district court's grant of summary judgment against the company on all its claims is affirmed, where: 1) the state Steel Act was not preempted by the federal Buy America Act and related federal regulations; 2) the Steel Act is not unconstitutional under the dormant Commerce Clause; 3) PennDOT's actions did not violate the Contract Clause; and 4) PennDOT's application of the Steel Act did not violate the Equal Protection Clause.

[01/20] Khan v. Dell Inc.
On a motion to compel arbitration brought by a defendant computer manufacturer in a case alleging design defects brought as a putative consumer class action by a purchaser, the district court's judgment denying the motion is vacated and the case remanded, where: 1) the arbitration agreement in the purchase contract did not indicate the parties' unambiguous intent not to arbitrate their disputes if the named arbitrator was unavailable; and 2) Section 5 of the Federal Arbitration Act requires a court to address such unavailability by appointing a substitute arbitrator.

More...