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Case Library
the canon by subject — drill the doctrine, then see what actually happened
Personal Jurisdiction
International Shoe Co. v. Washington
Yeazell · Ch. 2
Supreme Court of the United States · 1944–1945
Chief Justice Stone (author)
⚖⚖⚖··
~25 min
1 fork
minimum-contacts
pj-challenge
landmark-doctrine
Washington state assessed unemployment compensation taxes against International Shoe, a Delaware corporation headquartered in St. Louis with 11–13 salespeople working in Washington. Shoe contested personal jurisdiction — and in doing so handed the Court the facts it needed to establish the minimum-contacts test that still governs PJ today.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. v. Superior Court of California
Yeazell · Ch. 2
Superior Court of California (San Francisco County) → Cal. Ct. App. → Cal. Supreme Court → U.S. Supreme Court · 2012–2017
Justice Samuel Alito (majority)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~25 min
1 fork
personal-jurisdiction
specific-jurisdiction
mass-tort
pharmaceutical
forum-shopping
678 plaintiffs sued Bristol-Myers Squibb in San Francisco Superior Court over Plavix, a blood-thinner. Only 86 were California residents; the other 592 came from 33 other states, never bought or ingested Plavix in California, and were never injured there. BMS's California footprint was real — hundreds of sales reps, R&D staff, and roughly $900 million in Plavix revenue — but none of it touched the non-resident plaintiffs' claims. The California Supreme Court let jurisdiction ride anyway on a 'sliding scale' theory. The U.S. Supreme Court reversed 8-1, holding that specific jurisdiction requires a connection between the forum and the specific claim at issue, not just a defendant's general forum presence — closing off a mass-tort plaintiff's-forum-of-choice strategy nationwide.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
World-Wide Volkswagen Corp. v. Woodson
Yeazell · Ch. 2
Supreme Court of the United States · 1977–1980
Justice White (author)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~30 min
1 fork
purposeful-availment
anti-removal-joinder
pj-challenge
stream-of-commerce
The Robinsons were rear-ended in Oklahoma while driving a car they bought in New York. They sued in Oklahoma state court and named both the NY retailer (Seaway VW) and the NY/NJ/CT regional distributor (World-Wide VW) — defendants with zero Oklahoma contacts — alongside Volkswagen of America and Audi. The joinder was designed to prevent removal (complete diversity destroyed). Seaway and World-Wide moved to dismiss, eventually winning at SCOTUS and establishing that purposeful availment, not foreseeability alone, is the constitutional touchstone.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Calder v. Jones
Yeazell · Ch. 2
Superior Court of California → California Court of Appeal (2d Dist.) → (Cal. Supreme Court denied review) → Supreme Court of the United States · 1979–1984
Justice William H. Rehnquist (author)
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
1 fork
personal-jurisdiction
effects-test
intentional-tort
defamation
specific-jurisdiction
The National Enquirer published an October 9, 1979 article portraying actress Shirley Jones, a California resident, as an alcoholic unable to work. Jones sued in California. The article's writer, John South, researched mostly by phone from Florida; its editor, Iain Calder, reviewed and approved it from Florida and had visited California only twice, on unrelated trips. Both moved to quash service for lack of personal jurisdiction — they were Florida-based journalists who never went to California for this story. The Superior Court agreed, worried about chilling reporters; the Court of Appeal reversed; the California Supreme Court denied review. The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed unanimously, holding that intentional, tortious conduct 'expressly aimed' at a forum-state resident — with knowledge the harm will be felt there — supports specific jurisdiction even without the defendant ever setting foot in the state. The 'effects test' still governs intentional-tort personal jurisdiction today.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Burger King Corp. v. Rudzewicz
Yeazell · Ch. 2
U.S. District Court, S.D. Fla. → U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit → Supreme Court of the United States · 1979–1985
Justice William J. Brennan, Jr. (author)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~25 min
1 fork
personal-jurisdiction
minimum-contacts
purposeful-availment
franchise-agreement
choice-of-law
John Rudzewicz, a Michigan accountant, signed a 20-year Burger King franchise agreement in June 1979 obligating him to more than $1 million in payments to Burger King's Miami headquarters, governed by Florida law. When he and his partner Brian MacShara fell behind on royalty and rent payments, Burger King sued in the Southern District of Florida. Rudzewicz specially appeared to contest jurisdiction: he was a Michigan resident who had never set foot in Florida, and the claim didn't arise from any Florida act of his. The district court disagreed, tried the case, and entered a $228,875 judgment; the Eleventh Circuit reversed on due-process grounds; the Supreme Court reversed again, 6-2, holding that a long-term, deliberately cultivated contractual relationship with an out-of-state headquarters — complete with a choice-of-law clause and two decades of contemplated dealings — creates the minimum contacts due process requires, regardless of whether the defendant ever physically visited the forum.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Carnival Cruise Lines, Inc. v. Shute
Yeazell · Ch. 2
U.S. District Court, W.D. Wash. → U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit → Supreme Court of the United States · 1986–1991
Justice Harry A. Blackmun (author)
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~20 min
1 fork
personal-jurisdiction
forum-selection-clause
adhesion-contract
cruise-line
due-process
The Shutes, Washington residents, bought Carnival cruise passage through a Washington travel agent. The ticket's fine print designated Florida as the exclusive forum for any dispute. Mrs. Shute slipped on a wet deck mat and was injured during the cruise in international waters; the Shutes sued in the Western District of Washington. The district court granted summary judgment for Carnival on personal-jurisdiction grounds; the Ninth Circuit reversed, calling the unbargained-for forum clause unenforceable. The Supreme Court reversed 7-2: nonnegotiated forum-selection clauses in standardized passenger tickets are enforceable absent fraud or overreaching, because cruise lines have a legitimate interest in limiting litigation fora that benefits passengers through lower fares. Washington jurisdiction was ousted in favor of the ticket's Florida clause.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Subject-Matter Jurisdiction & Removal
Louisville & Nashville Railroad Co. v. Mottley
Yeazell · Ch. 2
Supreme Court of the United States · 1907–1908
Justice Moody (author)
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
1 fork
well-pleaded-complaint
smj
anticipated-defense-trap
The Mottleys held a lifetime railroad pass from an 1871 accident settlement. Congress banned free passes in 1906. When the railroad refused to renew, the Mottleys sued in federal court and embedded the anticipated federal constitutional defense into their complaint to establish SMJ. SCOTUS dismissed sua sponte: the well-pleaded complaint rule means federal question must arise from the plaintiff's own claim, never from an anticipated defense.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Murphy Bros., Inc. v. Michetti Pipe Stringing, Inc.
Yeazell · Ch. 2
Supreme Court of the United States · 1996–1999
Justice Ginsburg (author)
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
1 fork
removal-clock
formal-service
circuit-split-resolution
Michetti faxed a 'courtesy copy' of its filed complaint to Murphy Bros. on January 29, 1996 — three days before formal service on February 12. Murphy Bros. computed its 30-day removal window from formal service and filed on March 13. Michetti moved to remand, arguing the fax started the clock. The 11th Circuit agreed; SCOTUS reversed. The holding settled a circuit split: formal service — not informal receipt — starts the removal clock.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
State Farm Fire & Casualty Co. v. Tashire
Yeazell · Ch. 2
D. Or. → Ninth Circuit → U.S. Supreme Court · 1964–1967
Justice Abe Fortas (author)
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
1 fork
subject-matter-jurisdiction
minimal-diversity
interpleader
mass-tort
injunction-scope
A Greyhound bus and a pickup truck collided in Shasta County, California in September 1964, killing two passengers and injuring more than thirty others plus both drivers — claimants from five states and Canada, all chasing a single $20,000 liability policy. State Farm, the truck driver's insurer, deposited its policy limit in federal court and interpleaded every claimant, seeking to consolidate the fight over the fund into one proceeding and enjoin every other suit. The claimants were not all diverse from each other. The Ninth Circuit killed the interpleader on a different theory; the Supreme Court revived it, holding federal interpleader needs only minimal diversity between adverse claimants — but then cut the injunction down to size, refusing to let a $20,000 stakeholder freeze an entire mass tort.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Towne v. Eisner
Yeazell · Ch. 2
U.S. District Court (demurrer proceedings, 242 Fed. 702) → Supreme Court of the United States (direct writ of error) · 1913–1918
Mr. Justice Holmes (author)
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
1 fork
subject-matter-jurisdiction
federal-question
stock-dividend
income-tax
sixteenth-amendment
In December 1913, a corporation voted to transfer $1,500,000 of pre-1913 surplus profits to capital and issued a pro-rata stock dividend; taxpayer Towne received 4,174.5 shares in January 1914. The Collector of Internal Revenue for New York's Third District assessed and collected tax treating the $417,450 value of that stock dividend as income under the 1913 Revenue Act. Towne paid under protest and sued to recover it, arguing the assessment was both a misconstruction of the statute and unconstitutional as applied. The Collector moved to dismiss Towne's appeal for want of jurisdiction, insisting only statutory construction — not constitutionality — was really at stake. The Supreme Court rejected that framing: a taxpayer resisting the government's coercive assessment under its own reading of a statute may test both the construction and the constitutionality of that assessment together. On the merits, the Court reversed: a stock dividend is not taxable 'income.' The case predates the modern well-pleaded-complaint doctrine of Mottley by a generation but sits on the opposite side of the same coin — here, the plaintiff's own claim genuinely turned on the federal Constitution from the start.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Pleading
Ashcroft v. Iqbal
Yeazell · Ch. 5
Supreme Court of the United States · 2004–2009
Justice Kennedy (author)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~25 min
1 fork
plausibility-pleading
bivens
qualified-immunity
iqbal-twombly
Javaid Iqbal, a Pakistani Muslim detained after 9/11 as a 'person of high interest,' brought a Bivens constitutional tort action against AG Ashcroft and FBI Director Mueller, alleging they personally adopted a policy of detaining Arab Muslim men in harsh conditions on account of race, religion, and national origin. SCOTUS extended Twombly's plausibility standard to all federal civil claims and held the complaint failed to plausibly allege discriminatory intent by senior officials.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly
Yeazell · Ch. 5
Supreme Court of the United States · 2003–2007
Justice Souter (author)
⚖⚖⚖··
~25 min
1 fork
plausibility-pleading
antitrust
conley-overruled
twombly-standard
Telephone subscribers brought an antitrust class action against the Baby Bell ILECs (AT&T, Verizon, BellSouth, Qwest) alleging a conspiracy to restrain competition and divide local markets. The complaint alleged parallel conduct — the ILECs all refused to help rivals — without identifying any specific agreement. SCOTUS used the case to replace Conley v. Gibson's 'no set of facts' pleading standard with the plausibility standard, requiring factual allegations that render the claim more than merely possible.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Leatherman v. Tarrant County Narcotics Intelligence & Coordination Unit
Yeazell · Ch. 5
N.D. Tex. → 5th Cir. → U.S. Supreme Court · 1991–1993
Rehnquist, C.J. (unanimous)
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
1 fork
notice-pleading
heightened-pleading-rejected
section-1983
municipal-liability
rule-8a2
Two Tarrant County, Texas homeowners' civil-rights suits, consolidated for review: officers executing narcotics search warrants forcibly entered both homes after detecting odors associated with drug manufacturing. One homeowner said he was assaulted during the entry; another, absent at the time, came home to find her two dogs shot dead. Both sued the county's Narcotics Intelligence and Coordination Unit and the municipalities that employed the officers under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The defendants moved to dismiss, invoking the Fifth Circuit's own judge-made 'heightened pleading standard' for civil-rights claims against local governments — a standard found nowhere in the text of Rule 8 or Rule 9(b). The Supreme Court unanimously rejected it: Rule 8(a)(2)'s short-and-plain-statement standard is the pleading floor for § 1983 claims against municipalities, full stop.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Swierkiewicz v. Sorema, N.A.
Yeazell · Ch. 5
S.D.N.Y. → 2d Cir. → U.S. Supreme Court · 1998–2002
Thomas, J. (unanimous)
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
1 fork
notice-pleading
employment-discrimination
mcdonnell-douglas-evidentiary
heightened-pleading-rejected
rule-8a2
Akos Swierkiewicz, a 53-year-old Hungarian national, spent nearly six years as Sorema N.A.'s senior vice president and chief underwriting officer before CEO Francois Chavel demoted him and handed his responsibilities to Nicholas Papadopoulo — a 32-year-old French national, like Chavel, with roughly one year of underwriting experience against Swierkiewicz's twenty-six. Isolated and excluded from business meetings, then unable to get a meeting with Chavel, Swierkiewicz was fired in April 1997 and sued for age and national-origin discrimination. The district court and the Second Circuit both dismissed the complaint for failing to allege facts satisfying every element of McDonnell Douglas's prima facie case of discrimination — a trial-stage evidentiary framework the courts below imported wholesale into the pleading stage. The Supreme Court unanimously rejected that move: Rule 8(a)(2) notice pleading, not a prima facie case, is what a complaint must satisfy to survive a motion to dismiss.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Surowitz v. Hilton Hotels Corporation
Yeazell · Ch. 5
U.S. District Court → U.S. Court of Appeals (342 F.2d 606) → U.S. Supreme Court · 1963–1966
Black, J. (Harlan, J., concurring; Warren, C.J., and Fortas, J., not participating)
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
1 fork
rule-23b
derivative-suit
verification-requirement
shareholder-litigation
pro-forma-pleading-attack
Dora Surowitz was a Polish immigrant, a seamstress with limited English and little formal education, who had saved enough to buy thousands of dollars of Hilton Hotels stock. Her son-in-law, Irving Brilliant — a Harvard Law graduate, Columbia-trained economist, and professional investment adviser — bought roughly $45,000 in Hilton stock for the family starting in 1957 and, together with Chicago attorney Walter Rockler, built a derivative suit alleging Hilton's officers and directors had defrauded the company of some $8 million in working capital through suspicious purchases of Hilton Credit Corporation stock. At her deposition, Surowitz could not explain the complaint's allegations or name the defendants; she had verified it entirely on her son-in-law's say-so. The district court dismissed with prejudice, calling her verification a 'sham.' The Supreme Court reversed: Rule 23(b)'s verification requirement exists to screen out strike suits built on nothing, not to test whether an unsophisticated named plaintiff can personally recite a complaint her lawyers investigated and drafted.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Cooter & Gell v. Hartmarx Corporation
Yeazell · Ch. 5
D.D.C. → D.C. Circuit → U.S. Supreme Court · 1983–1990
O'Connor, J. (Rehnquist, C.J., Brennan, White, Marshall, Blackmun, Scalia, and Kennedy, JJ., joined in full; Stevens, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part as to Part III)
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
1 fork
rule-11-sanctions
frivolous-pleading
voluntary-dismissal
appellate-review
attorney-fees
The law firm Cooter & Gell filed antitrust complaints on behalf of Danik, Inc., a discount menswear retailer, accusing Hartmarx Corporation and its Hart, Schaffner & Marx and Hickey-Freeman divisions of a nationwide price-fixing and exclusive-dealing conspiracy. The prefiling investigation consisted of telephone calls to clothing stores in four East Coast cities — New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington, D.C. — from which the firm inferred a nationwide scheme. When Hartmarx moved for Rule 11 sanctions over the survey's thinness, Cooter & Gell voluntarily dismissed the whole action, hoping the dismissal would moot the sanctions fight. It didn't: the district court sanctioned the firm and its client anyway, the D.C. Circuit affirmed and layered on appellate fees, and the Supreme Court affirmed the core sanction while drawing a sharp line — Rule 11 reaches only district-court conduct, not the cost of defending a sanctions order on appeal.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Tellabs, Inc. v. Makor Issues & Rights, Ltd.
Yeazell · Ch. 5
N.D. Ill. → 7th Cir. → U.S. Supreme Court → (remanded to 7th Cir.) · 2002–2007
Ginsburg, J. (Roberts, C.J., Kennedy, Souter, Thomas, and Breyer, JJ., joined; Scalia and Alito, JJ., concurring in the judgment; Stevens, J., dissenting)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~20 min
1 fork
pslra-pleading
rule-9b
scienter
securities-fraud
heightened-pleading
Shareholders who bought Tellabs, Inc. stock between December 11, 2000 and June 19, 2001 sued the fiber-optic-equipment maker and its CEO, Richard Notebaert, under § 10(b) and Rule 10b-5, alleging Notebaert made materially false statements about demand for Tellabs's products while insiders knew otherwise. The PSLRA's heightened pleading bar requires a complaint to state, with particularity, facts giving rise to a 'strong inference' that the defendant acted with scienter — and the Seventh Circuit, reversing a district-court dismissal, applied a permissive 'reasonable person could infer' test to get the shareholders past that bar. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to decide how strong 'strong' really is, and set a demanding holistic standard: the inference of fraudulent intent must be at least as compelling as any competing innocent explanation. Remanded under that tougher test, the shareholders' unusually specific allegations survived anyway.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Joinder & Parties
Krupski v. Costa Crociere S.p.A.
Yeazell · Ch. 7
Supreme Court of the United States · 2007–2010
Justice Sotomayor (author)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~30 min
1 fork
relation-back
wrong-defendant
statute-of-limitations
rule-15c
Krupski was injured on a cruise ship. Her ticket identified Costa Crociere S.p.A. as the operating carrier, but her counsel sued Costa Cruise Lines N.V. — the booking agent. Costa Cruise disclosed Costa Crociere's identity three times in filed papers (corporate disclosure, answer, SJ motion). Krupski moved to amend after the contractual limitations period had run. SCOTUS reversed the 11th Circuit: the 'mistake' standard under Rule 15(c)(1)(C) asks what the correct defendant knew, not what the plaintiff knew — and relation back was compelled by shared defense counsel and identical subject matter.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Temple v. Synthes Corp.
Yeazell · Ch. 8
Supreme Court of the United States · 1989–1990
Per Curiam
⚖⚖⚖··
~25 min
1 fork
rule-19
joint-tortfeasors
permissive-joinder
indispensable-party
Temple had a metal plate-and-screw device surgically implanted. It broke. He sued Synthes (manufacturer) in federal court and the doctor and hospital separately in Louisiana state court. Synthes moved to dismiss for failure to join the doctor and hospital as 'indispensable' parties under Rule 19. SCOTUS reversed unanimously: joint tortfeasors are permissive parties — a plaintiff may sue them in separate forums without any Rule 19 problem.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Provident Tradesmens Bank & Trust Co. v. Patterson
Yeazell · Ch. 8
E.D. Pa. → 3d Cir. → U.S. Supreme Court · 1963–1968
Justice Harlan (author)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~30 min
1 fork
rule-19
indispensable-parties
equity-and-good-conscience
insurance-subrogation
sua-sponte-appellate-issue
Donald Cionci, driving Edward Dutcher's car under disputed permission, collided with a truck — killing himself, his passenger John Lynch, and the truck driver, and severely injuring another passenger. Dutcher's $100,000 liability policy with Lumbermens Mutual turned entirely on whether Cionci had permission to drive. Provident Tradesmens Bank, administering Lynch's estate, sued Cionci's estate (administrator George Patterson) in federal court and won at trial after Pennsylvania's Dead Man's Act barred Dutcher's adverse testimony. On appeal, Patterson's counsel argued for the first time that Dutcher — never joined as a party — was 'indispensable,' requiring the entire fully-tried judgment to be thrown out. The Third Circuit agreed. The Supreme Court reversed unanimously, replacing the rigid 'indispensable party' label with Rule 19(b)'s pragmatic four-factor equity-and-good-conscience balancing test — now the operative standard for every Rule 19 joinder-infeasibility question.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Discovery
Hickman v. Taylor
Yeazell · Ch. 9
Supreme Court of the United States · 1945–1947
Justice Murphy (author)
⚖⚖⚖··
~25 min
1 fork
work-product
attorney-mental-impressions
discovery-privilege
landmark-doctrine
A tugboat sank in the Delaware River in 1943, killing five crew members. Taylor's attorneys interviewed the four survivors before any suit was filed. When Hickman's lawyers (representing the estates) served interrogatories demanding the attorneys' written notes, private memoranda, and summaries of what the witnesses had said, Taylor's lawyers refused. The case established the work product doctrine — now codified in Rule 26(b)(3).
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Zubulake v. UBS Warburg LLC
Yeazell · Ch. 9
S.D.N.Y. (Scheindlin, J.) · 2002–2005
Judge Shira Scheindlin
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~35 min
2 forks
esi
cost-shifting
spoliation
legal-hold
adverse-inference
Laura Zubulake sued UBS Warburg for sex discrimination and retaliation. Key emails — which UBS's own employees had sent discussing her performance and termination — were stored on backup tapes never indexed for easy retrieval. Restoration would cost an estimated $175,000. Judge Scheindlin's series of five opinions (Zubulake I–V) established the modern ESI cost-shifting test, the litigation-hold framework, and the spoliation sanctions standards now largely codified in Rule 37(e).
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Waymo LLC v. Uber Technologies, Inc.
— (modern canon; Classic Cases set: Waymo) · trade secrets / spoliation & discovery sanctions
N.D. Cal. (Alsup, J.) · 2017–2018
Hon. William H. Alsup
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~40 min
3 forks
trade-secrets
spoliation
ephemeral-messaging
criminal-referral
fifth-amendment
The trade-secret discovery war that produced a criminal referral from the bench in the middle of a civil trial. Uber acquired Otto — Anthony Levandowski's startup — after Levandowski downloaded roughly 14,000 Waymo files on his way out the door; Waymo sued to stop Uber's entire self-driving program. The drama lived in the discovery record: a letter from Uber's own security manager describing corporate espionage that Uber's lawyers held back, the company's use of self-deleting messaging, and a defendant's key engineer taking the Fifth on every question. Played across the preservation, disclosure, and settlement forks that decided the case before any jury could.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Victor Stanley, Inc. v. Creative Pipe, Inc. — the CCleaner spoliation sanctions
— (e-discovery canon) · spoliation sanctions / when a litigation hold gets you a default judgment and a contempt finding
D. Md. (Grimm, M.J.; Garbis & Bennett, JJ.) · 2006–2019
Hon. Paul W. Grimm (Magistrate Judge, spoliation opinion); Hon. Marvin J. Garbis and Hon. Richard D. Bennett (District Judges)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~30 min
1 fork
esi
spoliation
adverse-inference
contempt
default-judgment
The e-discovery case Judge Paul Grimm called 'the single most egregious example of spoliation that I have encountered in any case.' Victor Stanley, Inc. (VSI), an outdoor site-furnishings maker, sued Creative Pipe, Inc. and its president Mark Pappas for copyright and patent infringement after tracing a series of downloads from VSI's password-protected design library to a fictitious bidder calling himself 'Fred Bass' — an alias Pappas used to lift VSI's copyrighted drawings. Once the court ordered preservation, Pappas ran disk-scrubbing utilities (Easy Cleaner, CCleaner) against his own computer and had files and emails deleted — including runs in 2008 and 2009, long after four separate written and oral preservation orders were on the docket. The result: a default judgment on the copyright claim, a civil-contempt finding against Pappas personally, and a decade of largely unsuccessful efforts by VSI to collect more than $4 million in resulting judgments, fees, and sanctions. Played from VSI's chair at the outset of discovery — the diligence that built the paper trail which later proved Creative Pipe's bad faith.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Residential Funding Corp. v. DeGeorge Financial Corp. — the emails found three days before trial
— (e-discovery canon) · the ordinary-negligence standard / when a trial court's bad-faith bar is itself the reversible error
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit (Jacobs, Cabranes, F.I. Parker, JJ.); U.S. District Court, D. Conn. below (Arterton, J.) · 1999–2002
Hon. Janet Bond Arterton (D. Conn., trial); Circuit Judges Dennis Jacobs, José A. Cabranes, and Fred I. Parker (2d Cir. panel)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~25 min
2 forks
esi
spoliation
adverse-inference
email-production
backup-tapes
The Second Circuit's leading statement on the culpability standard for adverse-inference sanctions — decided by correcting a trial judge who had set the bar too high. Residential Funding Corp. (RFC) sued DeGeorge Financial Corp. over a mortgage-warehouse lending relationship that fell apart in late 1998; DeGeorge counterclaimed. When DeGeorge went after RFC's own emails from the disputed period, RFC strung the request along for months — promising production dates it blew through, then producing 128 emails covering January through September 1998 while the critical October–December window stayed empty. Three days before trial, DeGeorge finally got RFC's backup tapes directly; its vendor found roughly 950,000 emails in four days, including about 4,000 responsive messages from exactly the missing months. Judge Arterton denied DeGeorge's sanctions motion mid-trial, holding that only bad faith or gross negligence could support an adverse-inference instruction. The jury awarded RFC $96.4 million anyway. On appeal, the Second Circuit vacated: ordinary negligence can suffice, and RFC's own 'purposefully sluggish' conduct might independently warrant sanctions. Played from DeGeorge's chair — the discovery-side diligence that built the dated record of broken promises the Second Circuit later relied on.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Privilege
In re Pacific Pictures Corp. — the Superman heirs saga
— (privilege & work-product canon) · common-interest / joint-defense and the no-selective-waiver rule
United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit · 2011–2012
Wardlaw, J. (9th Cir. panel); Hon. Otis D. Wright II (C.D. Cal.)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~30 min
2 forks
common-interest
joint-defense
waiver
selective-waiver
attorney-client-privilege
The fight over the Superman copyrights. Attorney Marc Toberoff represented the heirs of Superman's creators, Jerome Siegel and Joseph Shuster, in their bid to recapture the copyrights by statutory termination — while also holding, through Pacific Pictures Corp. and IP Worldwide, a business stake in the heirs' claims. A disgruntled former Toberoff attorney took internal documents (the 'Toberoff Timeline') and delivered them to DC Comics; Toberoff's camp had separately handed privileged materials to the U.S. Attorney under a confidentiality agreement, seeking a criminal probe of the theft. When DC Comics sought the documents, the courts held the privilege waived: voluntary disclosure to the government waives, there is no selective waiver, and common-interest cannot shield a lawyer's business dealings. The teaching case for what NOT to do with privileged material and an aligned party.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Ambac Assurance Corp. v. Countrywide Home Loans, Inc. — the merger memos that weren't privileged
— (privilege & work-product canon) · the common-interest doctrine's business/legal-interest line
Supreme Court, New York County → Appellate Division, First Department → New York Court of Appeals · 2008 (disclosure) – 2016 (Court of Appeals decision)
Pigott, J. (majority, joined by Abdus-Salaam, Stein & Fahey, JJ.); Rivera, J., dissenting, joined by Garcia, J.; DiFiore, C.J., not participating
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
1 fork
privilege
common-interest
waiver
merger
financial-crisis
The case that drew the line between a common LEGAL interest and a common BUSINESS interest in privilege law. As Bank of America moved to acquire Countrywide Financial in the middle of the 2008 mortgage crisis, the two companies' separate counsel traded roughly 400 attorney-client communications on pre-closing legal issues — regulatory approvals, contractual obligations to third parties, employee benefit plans, tax consequences — under a merger-agreement confidentiality clause. No lawsuit existed yet. When Ambac Assurance, a bond insurer that had guaranteed Countrywide-issued mortgage-backed securities, later sued over the same loans and sought those communications in discovery, Bank of America invoked the common-interest doctrine. The New York Court of Appeals held that the doctrine protects only communications tied to litigation, pending or reasonably anticipated, at the time of sharing — a merger's 'successful completion' is a business interest, not a legal one. The privilege was gone, and the documents came out. Played from Countrywide's chair in early 2008, at the moment the sharing decision was made — two years before the lawsuit that would later expose it.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. v. Chiles Power Supply, Inc. — the Entran II settlement-privilege fight
— (privilege canon) · the settlement-communications privilege / when a Rule 26(c) confidentiality order outlasts a stranger's attempt to break it
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit (Boggs, Suhrheinrich, Siler, JJ.); U.S. District Court, N.D. Ohio below · 1998–2003
Circuit Judges Danny J. Boggs, Richard F. Suhrheinrich, and Eugene E. Siler Jr. (6th Cir. panel); N.D. Ohio district judge not named in the panel opinion as reviewed
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~20 min
1 fork
settlement-privilege
protective-order
confidentiality-order
rule-24-intervention
fre-408
The Sixth Circuit case recognizing a settlement-communications privilege — tested years later by a stranger to the settlement trying to break it open. Heatway (Chiles Power Supply) bought Entran II rubber hose from Goodyear for radiant heating systems it sold to Colorado homeowners; when the hose failed, Heatway refused to pay Goodyear's $2,093,000 contract price. Goodyear sued in the Northern District of Ohio; Heatway counterclaimed for breach of warranty; a jury sided with Goodyear in February 2000 ('Goodyear I'). Around the same time, Goodyear and Heatway were also negotiating over the separate Colorado litigation the failed hose had spawned, under a confidentiality order the Ohio district court had entered over those talks. When Heatway's principal, Daniel Chiles, told Contractor magazine that 'the day before this trial began, Goodyear made us an offer ... sign this paper and agree that the fault is with homeowners,' Colorado homeowner-plaintiff Robert Julian intervened under Rule 24 and moved to vacate the confidentiality order so he could use the settlement communications against Goodyear in his own case. The district court refused, and the Sixth Circuit affirmed: settlement communications are privileged, the fact that talks occurred is not, and a would-be user of the content still has to show a legitimate, admissible use for it. Played from Goodyear/Chiles' chair — the decision to lock the settlement talks behind a confidentiality order in the first place, later vindicated against exactly the kind of third-party raid the order was built to survive.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
United States v. Mett — the pension-fund memo the government should never have gotten
— (privilege canon) · the fiduciary exception's limit / when a trustee's own-liability advice stays privileged
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit (B. Fletcher, Tashima, JJ.; Singleton, D.J., sitting by designation) · 1991–1999
Circuit Judges Betty B. Fletcher and A. Wallace Tashima; District Judge James K. Singleton, sitting by designation (9th Cir. panel)
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~20 min
1 fork
attorney-client-privilege
fiduciary-exception
erisa
criminal-prosecution
de-novo-review
The Ninth Circuit case that drew the outer boundary of the ERISA fiduciary exception to attorney-client privilege — by reversing 15 felony convictions after the government used a lawyer's private advice against his own clients. William Mett and Marvin Wiseman, trustees of a pension benefit plan, borrowed roughly $800,000 from the plan without adequate security or repayment. Their attorney, Thomas Foley, wrote them a memorandum on August 19, 1991 addressing 'the criminal and civil sanctions which may' follow from that borrowing — advice about their own personal exposure, not about how to run the plan. Mett and Wiseman moved pretrial to suppress that memo and a related one on attorney-client privilege grounds; the district court denied the motion, reasoning that as ERISA fiduciaries their communications with plan counsel fell within the 'fiduciary exception,' which normally lets plan beneficiaries pierce a trustee's privilege for advice about administering the plan. The government called Foley at trial, put the memos in front of the jury, and won convictions on 15 counts. The Ninth Circuit reversed on de novo review: the fiduciary exception exists to let beneficiaries see advice about administering the plan, not to strip privilege from a trustee's own lawyer's advice about the trustee's personal criminal and civil exposure — extending it that far, the court warned, 'threatens to swallow the entirety of the attorney-client privilege for ERISA trustees.' Played from the defense chair — the correct pretrial move real counsel made, vindicated only on appeal after the trial court got the privilege question wrong.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Summary Judgment
Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc.
Yeazell · Ch. 11
Supreme Court of the United States · 1984–1986
Justice White (author)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~30 min
1 fork
summary-judgment
actual-malice
standard-of-proof
libel
sj-trilogy
Liberty Lobby and its founder Willis Carto sued Jack Anderson (publisher of The Investigator) for libel, claiming that articles described them as neo-Nazi and anti-Semitic. Anderson moved for summary judgment. The dispute: in a libel case involving public figures requiring clear-and-convincing evidence of actual malice, does the SJ 'genuine dispute' analysis apply the preponderance standard (default Rule 56 standard) or the trial's heightened actual-malice standard? SCOTUS held the trial standard applies on summary judgment.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Celotex Corp. v. Catrett
Yeazell · Ch. 11
Supreme Court of the United States · 1984–1986
Justice Rehnquist (author)
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~30 min
1 fork
summary-judgment
absence-of-evidence
burden-shifting
asbestos
sj-trilogy
Myrtle Catrett's husband died of mesothelioma. She sued 15 asbestos manufacturers. Celotex moved for summary judgment, submitting nothing — no affidavits, no expert declarations — beyond a brief pointing out that Catrett had produced no evidence that Louis Catrett was ever exposed to a Celotex product. The D.C. Circuit held this was insufficient; Celotex had to affirmatively negate exposure. SCOTUS reversed, establishing that a defendant who doesn't bear the trial burden can win SJ by pointing to the evidentiary gap.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
US Dominion, Inc. v. Fox News Network, LLC
— (modern canon; Classic Cases set: Dominion) · defamation / actual malice, partial summary judgment & settlement
Del. Super. Ct. (Complex Commercial Div.) (Davis, J.) · 2021–2023
Hon. Eric M. Davis
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~35 min
3 forks
defamation
actual-malice
partial-summary-judgment
discovery-record
trial-day-settle
The defamation case where discovery all but decided the merits. Dominion's texts-and-emails record captured Fox anchors and executives privately calling the stolen-election claims false while Fox aired them — making the New York Times v. Sullivan actual-malice question, normally a defendant's fortress, nearly indefensible. Davis resolved falsity against Fox as a matter of law and set actual malice for the jury. Then, at the courthouse door with the jury seated, Fox paid $787.5 million to keep its executives off the stand. A Delaware Superior Court case played on the FRCP-analog summary-judgment and settlement forks.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Scott v. Harris
Yeazell · Ch. 8
N.D. Ga. → Eleventh Circuit → U.S. Supreme Court · 2001–2007
Justice Scalia (author)
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~20 min
1 fork
summary-judgment
rule-56
genuine-dispute
video-evidence
qualified-immunity
A high-speed chase through Coweta County, Georgia ended when Deputy Timothy Scott rammed Victor Harris's fleeing car off the road, leaving Harris a quadriplegic. Harris sued under §1983 for excessive force; Scott moved for summary judgment on qualified immunity. The district court and the Eleventh Circuit both denied the motion — on summary judgment, courts normally credit the non-movant's account, and Harris said he had the chase under control and posed no threat. But the police cruiser's dashcam had recorded the whole thing. The Supreme Court watched the tape, held that no reasonable jury could believe Harris's version once the video contradicted it, and reversed 8-1 — carving out a narrow but consequential exception to the rule that courts cannot weigh evidence or resolve factual disputes at the summary-judgment stage.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. v. Zenith Radio Corp.
Yeazell · Ch. 11
Federal District Court → U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit → U.S. Supreme Court · 1974–1986
Justice Powell (author)
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~30 min
1 fork
summary-judgment
rule-56
antitrust
sherman-act
burden-shifting
Zenith Radio and National Union Electric sued 21 Japanese consumer-electronics manufacturers, alleging a 20-year conspiracy to fix artificially high prices in Japan while dumping television sets below cost in the United States to drive American competitors out of the market. After nearly a decade of discovery, the manufacturers moved for summary judgment. The district court found most of Zenith's evidence inadmissible and granted the motion; the Third Circuit reversed, crediting a reasonable-factfinder inference of conspiracy from the direct and circumstantial record. The Supreme Court reversed again, 5-4: a plaintiff opposing summary judgment on an antitrust conspiracy claim must offer evidence that 'tends to exclude the possibility' the defendants acted independently, and where the alleged scheme makes no economic sense — a conspiracy that loses money for twenty years without ever collecting the payoff — more persuasive evidence than usual is required to survive the motion. Decided the same term as Anderson v. Liberty Lobby and Celotex v. Catrett, Matsushita completes the 1986 summary-judgment trilogy and remains the leading case on screening implausible claims at the Rule 56 stage.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Jury Trial
Beacon Theatres, Inc. v. Westover
Yeazell · Ch. 12
Supreme Court of the United States · 1957–1959
Justice Black (author)
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~30 min
1 fork
seventh-amendment
jury-trial
equitable-merger
antitrust
sequencing
Fox West Coast Theatres held clearances (licensed territorial monopolies) preventing Beacon from showing first-run films in the San Bernardino area. Beacon threatened antitrust treble-damage suits. Fox preemptively filed for declaratory judgment (clearances are lawful) and injunctive relief. Beacon counterclaimed for antitrust damages — a legal claim with a jury right. The district court ordered Fox's equitable claims tried to the judge first; those findings would preclude the jury on Beacon's antitrust damages. SCOTUS reversed: the Seventh Amendment protects the jury right on legal claims against equitable-merger maneuvers.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Dairy Queen, Inc. v. Wood
Yeazell · Ch. 12
Supreme Court of the United States · 1961–1962
Justice Black (author)
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~25 min
1 fork
seventh-amendment
jury-trial
equitable-labels
franchise
accounting-vs-damages
Dairy Queen franchisee Wood failed to pay required fees. Dairy Queen sued, characterizing its remedy as an equitable 'accounting for profits,' an injunction, and related equitable relief — deliberately avoiding the word 'damages.' Wood demanded a jury trial. The district court denied it, accepting Dairy Queen's equitable framing. SCOTUS reversed: where the essence of the claim is breach-of-contract money damages, a plaintiff cannot strip the defendant's jury right by labeling the relief 'equitable.'
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Tull v. United States
Yeazell · Ch. 12
E.D. Va. → Fourth Circuit → U.S. Supreme Court · 1983–1987
Justice Brennan (author)
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~25 min
1 fork
seventh-amendment
jury-trial
civil-penalties
clean-water-act
liability-vs-remedy-split
Real estate developer Edward Tull filled wetlands on Chincoteague Island, Virginia — the Ocean Breeze Mobile Homes site, Mire Pond Properties, Eel Creek, and Fowling Gut Extended — without the permits the Clean Water Act required. The government sued for an injunction and civil penalties that could have reached nearly $23 million. Tull demanded a jury trial; the district court said no and tried the case to the bench, ultimately fining him $325,000. The Supreme Court agreed the Seventh Amendment guaranteed Tull a jury on whether he was liable at all — the government's suit functioned like a common-law action in debt — but drew a sharp line at the courthouse door: the dollar amount of the penalty, once liability is found, is for the judge, not the jury. A defendant who demands a jury trial does not get a jury to argue the number down.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Appeal & Preclusion
Parklane Hosiery Co. v. Shore
Yeazell · Ch. 13
Supreme Court of the United States · 1975–1979
Justice Stewart (author)
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~30 min
1 fork
collateral-estoppel
issue-preclusion
non-mutual-offensive
sec-enforcement
securities-fraud
The SEC sued Parklane Hosiery for issuing a materially false and misleading proxy statement. After a bench trial, the court found the proxy statement false. Shareholder Shore then brought a class action for securities fraud damages — the same proxy statement. Shore moved for partial summary judgment using NMOCE: because Parklane had fully litigated and lost the falsity issue to the SEC, it should be precluded from re-litigating it in the class action. SCOTUS held NMOCE is available in federal court subject to the four-factor fairness test.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Taylor v. Sturgell
Yeazell · Ch. 13
Supreme Court of the United States · 2004–2008
Justice Ginsburg (author)
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~30 min
1 fork
non-party-preclusion
virtual-representation
foia
claim-preclusion
taylor-v-sturgell
Aviation enthusiast Greg Herrick filed a FOIA request for blueprints of a vintage Fairchild F-45 aircraft; the FAA denied it on trade-secret grounds; Herrick's lawsuit was dismissed with prejudice. Herrick's friend Brent Taylor then filed his own identical FOIA request. The FAA argued Taylor was precluded by Herrick's judgment because they had the same interests and Taylor had known about the prior suit. SCOTUS unanimously rejected 'virtual representation' as a freestanding preclusion doctrine.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Epic Games, Inc. v. Apple Inc.
— (modern canon; Classic Cases set: Epic) · antitrust standing, dispositive findings & injunction enforcement
N.D. Cal. (Gonzalez Rogers, J.) → 9th Cir. → cert. denied (U.S.) · 2020–2025
Hon. Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers
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~45 min
3 forks
antitrust
manufactured-standing
bench-trial
anti-steering-injunction
contempt
Epic detonated its own App Store contract to pick this fight. It hid a direct-payment bypass in Fortnite, activated it knowing Apple would terminate the developer account, and sued the same day — manufacturing a live injury to litigate the 30% commission. Epic then lost nine of ten antitrust theories at a bench trial and won exactly one: the anti-steering injunction under California's UCL. Apple obeyed that one order so grudgingly — a scare-screen interstitial and a 27% fee on outside purchases — that the court found it in willful contempt and referred an Apple executive for criminal prosecution. Played from Epic's chair across the standing gambit, the dispositive findings, and the enforcement war.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Mohawk Industries, Inc. v. Carpenter
Yeazell · Ch. 13
N.D. Ga. → 11th Cir. (541 F.3d 1048) → U.S. Supreme Court · 2008–2009
N.D. Ga. District Judge (order compelling disclosure); 11th Cir. panel; Justice Sonia Sotomayor (SCOTUS author)
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~25 min
1 fork
collateral-order-doctrine
final-judgment-rule
interlocutory-appeal
attorney-client-privilege
discovery-order
Norman Carpenter, a Mohawk shift supervisor, emailed HR alleging Mohawk employed undocumented immigrants; the company had him meet with its outside counsel, who allegedly pressured him to recant, and Mohawk fired him when he refused. Suing for retaliatory discharge, Carpenter moved to compel disclosure of that attorney-client meeting; the district court agreed Mohawk had waived the privilege through positions it took in a separate, related proceeding. Rather than comply and preserve the issue for a later appeal, Mohawk tried to appeal the disclosure order immediately under the collateral order doctrine — and lost that fight all the way to the Supreme Court, which used the case to hold that privilege-adverse discovery orders are never immediately appealable collateral orders.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Semtek International Inc. v. Lockheed Martin Corp.
Yeazell · Ch. 13
Cal. Superior Court → C.D. Cal. (removed, diversity) → 9th Cir. → Circuit Court for Baltimore City, Md. (refiled) → Md. Ct. Spec. App. → U.S. Supreme Court · 1990s–2001
C.D. Cal. District Judge (SOL dismissal); Justice Antonin Scalia (SCOTUS author)
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~25 min
1 fork
claim-preclusion
res-judicata
final-judgment-rule
frcp-41b
diversity-jurisdiction
Semtek sued Lockheed Martin in California state court; Lockheed removed to federal court on diversity grounds, and the district court dismissed the suit as time-barred under California's two-year statute of limitations — a dismissal Rule 41(b)'s own text calls an 'adjudication upon the merits.' Semtek then refiled the identical claims in Maryland, where the clock hadn't run. Lockheed argued the California dismissal barred the Maryland suit outright, and won that argument at both the Maryland trial court and the Maryland Court of Special Appeals. The Supreme Court unanimously reversed: Rule 41(b)'s merits language controls only whether a plaintiff can refile in the *same* court system, not whether it binds every other court in the country — a diversity court's preclusion rule ordinarily borrows the rule of the state where it sits. Played from Lockheed's chair: the defense properly pleaded claim preclusion and pressed the broadest reading of Rule 41(b) available — a reasonable, good-faith position that a unanimous Court ultimately rejected.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
United States v. Beggerly
Yeazell · Ch. 13
S.D. Miss. → 5th Cir. (114 F.3d 484) → U.S. Supreme Court · 1979–1998
S.D. Miss. District Judge (dismissal for lack of jurisdiction); Chief Justice William Rehnquist (SCOTUS author)
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~25 min
1 fork
rule-60b
independent-action
grave-miscarriage-of-justice
equitable-tolling
quiet-title-act
In 1979 the United States sued Chris Beggerly's predecessor-in-interest and roughly 200 other landowners to quiet title to Horn Island, Mississippi. On the eve of trial in 1982 the parties settled: title went to the government, which paid the defendants $208,175.87. In 1994 — a decade after the settlement, and three years after a genealogical researcher turned up an 18th-century Spanish land grant in the National Archives — the Beggerlys sued to set the settlement aside, arguing the newly found grant proved they'd owned Horn Island outright all along. The district court found no jurisdiction; the Fifth Circuit reversed, finding it under both Rule 60(b)'s independent-action doctrine and the Quiet Title Act. Played from the government's chair, defending the finality of a settlement it had already paid for once: the government declined to burn a reconsideration motion at the Fifth Circuit and instead preserved the issue for certiorari — where it won unanimously, on the strength of a rule that independent actions to reopen judgments require a 'grave miscarriage of justice,' not just diligence that could have been better.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Copyright
Oracle America, Inc. v. Google LLC
— (modern canon; also Classic Cases set #10) · software copyright / fair use
N.D. Cal. (Alsup, J.) → Fed. Cir. (×2) → Supreme Court of the United States · 2010–2021
Hon. William Alsup (who famously taught himself Java); Justice Breyer (author, 593 U.S. 1)
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~40 min
2 forks
copyright
fair-use
api-declarations
two-federal-circuit-reversals
scotus-cert
The decade-long war over 37 Java API packages in Android. Two jury trials before a judge who learned Java to check the experts' homework; two Federal Circuit reversals each erasing a Google win; an $8.8 billion damages demand; and a Supreme Court decision that resolved the biggest fair-use question in software history while pointedly ASSUMING copyrightability rather than deciding it. Played from Google's chair: hold the fair-use verdict at the district court, then bet the company on cert.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc. v. Nation Enterprises
— (copyright canon) · fair use / unpublished works
S.D.N.Y. (Owen, J.) → 2d Cir. (723 F.2d 195) → U.S. Supreme Court · 1979–1985
Hon. Richard Owen (S.D.N.Y.); Justice Sandra Day O'Connor (SCOTUS author)
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~25 min
1 fork
fair-use
unpublished-work
right-of-first-publication
market-harm
heart-of-the-work
Harper & Row and Reader's Digest paid Gerald Ford for the rights to his unpublished memoir, A Time to Heal, and licensed Time Magazine an exclusive $25,000 prepublication excerpt covering the Nixon pardon. Someone leaked the manuscript to The Nation before Time's issue ran; The Nation's editor rushed out a 2,250-word piece built around roughly 300-400 verbatim words lifted from the memoir's most newsworthy passages. Time canceled its remaining $12,500 payment and pulled its own piece. Harper & Row sued for infringement, won at trial, lost on fair use at the Second Circuit, and took the fight to the Supreme Court — which used the case to hold that an unpublished work's status weighs heavily against fair use, that quality (the 'heart of the work') beats quantity, and that a canceled license is exactly the kind of market harm the fair-use inquiry exists to catch. Played from the copyright holder's chair: hold the trial win, survive a Court of Appeals reversal, and bet on cert.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
The Authors Guild, Inc. v. Google, Inc.
— (copyright canon) · fair use / mass digitization
S.D.N.Y. (Chin, J.) → 2d Cir. · 2005–2016
Hon. Denny Chin (S.D.N.Y. / 2d Cir.); Judge Pierre Leval (2d Cir., panel author)
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~25 min
1 fork
fair-use
mass-digitization
transformative-use
summary-judgment
google-books
Google scanned roughly 20 million books — most still under copyright, almost none licensed — to build the Google Books search index, displaying only short snippets around a searcher's query terms and distributing digital copies to partner libraries. The Authors Guild sued for infringement at a scale no prior fair-use case had confronted. Google moved for summary judgment, arguing the project served an entirely different purpose than reading the books themselves: search and discovery, not consumption. The district court and, unanimously, the Second Circuit agreed — the scanning and snippet display were highly transformative, Google's commercial motive didn't matter, and the limited public display couldn't substitute for buying the books. Played from the Authors Guild's chair: years of litigation, a full record, and a losing argument on transformative use that the Second Circuit rejected across the board.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Blanch v. Koons
— (copyright canon) · fair use / commercial appropriation art
S.D.N.Y. → 2d Cir. · 2000–2006
S.D.N.Y. District Judge (summary judgment for Koons); Judge Robert D. Sack (2d Cir., panel author)
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
1 fork
fair-use
transformative-use
appropriation-art
summary-judgment
commercial-art
Fashion photographer Andrea Blanch shot 'Silk Sandals by Gucci' — a close-up of a woman's legs and sandaled feet — for Allure magazine, which licensed it for that one use. Jeff Koons cut the legs and sandals out of the photograph, flipped and altered them, and floated them alongside other appropriated images in his painting 'Niagara,' which sold for hundreds of thousands of dollars and hung at the Guggenheim. Blanch sued for infringement; Koons raised fair use. The district court and the Second Circuit both sided with Koons: the recontextualized image commented on mass media and advertising rather than merely reproducing Blanch's photo, Koons took only what the commentary required, and Blanch had never licensed the image for any other use, so there was no market to harm. Played from Blanch's chair: a fully developed record, a well-argued opposition to summary judgment, and a loss on three of four fair-use factors.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Eldred v. Ashcroft
— (copyright canon) · Copyright Clause / term extension
D.D.C. → D.C. Cir. → U.S. Supreme Court · 1999–2003
D.D.C. District Judge; D.C. Circuit panel; Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg (SCOTUS author)
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~25 min
1 fork
copyright-clause
limited-times
term-extension
first-amendment
public-domain
Eric Eldred ran a website republishing public-domain books online. When Congress passed the 1998 Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act — retroactively adding 20 years to every existing and future copyright term — works Eldred was counting on entering the public domain stayed locked up instead. Eldred and other publishers sued, arguing the Copyright Clause's 'limited Times' language must impose some real ceiling that endless extensions-of-extensions would violate, and that the CTEA, as a content-neutral speech restriction, failed First Amendment scrutiny. The district court and the D.C. Circuit both rejected the challenge, and the Supreme Court affirmed 7-2: Congress's copyright-term power is broad, 'limited' means merely finite (not fixed forever), and copyright's own internal accommodations for speech meant heightened First Amendment review didn't apply. Played from Eldred's chair: the losing declaratory-judgment challenger who took a genuinely novel constitutional theory all the way to the Supreme Court and lost, cleanly, 7-2.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Patent Prosecution
Amazon 1-Click — U.S. Patent 5,960,411
— (patent-prosecution canon) · prosecution strategy / reexamination and continuations
USPTO (examination + ex parte reexamination) → Fed. Cir. (parallel infringement appeal) · 1997–2010
USPTO examining corps; Central Reexamination Unit
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~25 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
business-method
reexamination
obviousness
preliminary-injunction-vacated
The most litigated business-method patent of its era. Amazon's one-click checkout issued in 1999, won a preliminary injunction against Barnes & Noble weeks later, then watched the Federal Circuit vacate that injunction over a substantial validity question. Years afterward a citizen-requested reexamination forced Amazon to narrow the independent claims by amendment to keep them alive. Played from the applicant's chair: the prosecution and reexamination choices that decide whether a broad claim survives contact with the prior art.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
CRISPR — Broad Institute v. UC Berkeley (U.S. 8,697,359)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · prioritized examination / the race to issue and the interference
USPTO (prioritized examination) → PTAB Interference No. 106,048 → Fed. Cir. · 2012–2018
USPTO examining corps; PTAB (Patent Trial and Appeal Board)
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~30 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
prioritized-examination
interference
no-interference-in-fact
race-to-issue
The patent fight of the genome-editing era. UC Berkeley filed first on CRISPR-Cas9; the Broad Institute filed later but paid for prioritized examination and issued first on the eukaryotic-cell application in 2014. Berkeley provoked an interference; the PTAB found no interference-in-fact and the Federal Circuit affirmed — leaving both sides with patents. Played from the Broad's chair: the prosecution-speed and family-building choices that won the race to issue.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Apple iPhone Design Patents — D593,087 & D618,677 (Apple v. Samsung)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · design-patent prosecution / the drawings are the claim
USPTO (design examination) → N.D. Cal. → Fed. Cir. → U.S. Supreme Court · 2007–2018
USPTO design examining corps (TC 2900); Hon. Lucy H. Koh (N.D. Cal.)
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~25 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
design-patent
single-claim
article-of-manufacture
continuation-family
The design patents at the center of the smartphone wars. A design patent is a strange animal: one claim, and the drawings ARE the claim — solid lines claim the ornamental design, broken lines disclaim everything else. Apple raced its iPhone front-face designs to issue and built a continuation family off a single disclosure, then turned them into a billion-dollar damages theory under 35 U.S.C. 289. Played from the applicant's chair: the prosecution choices — speed to grant, and family-building — that make a design patent an enforceable weapon rather than a picture on a wall.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Moderna LNP — U.S. 10,144,942 (Moderna v. Arbutus / Pfizer)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · the LNP thicket / owner's chair and challenger's chair in the mRNA wars
USPTO (examination) → PTAB (inter partes review) → Fed. Cir. · 2016–2023
USPTO examining corps; Patent Trial and Appeal Board
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~30 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
biotech
lipid-nanoparticle
mrna
inter-partes-review
The modern post-grant epic, sitting in both chairs. Moderna built a dense family of mRNA and lipid-nanoparticle patents (U.S. 10,144,942 among them) — the owner's-chair problem of prosecuting a thicket without tripping double-patenting. It also sat in the challenger's chair: to clear freedom to operate, Moderna became the PETITIONER attacking Arbutus's foundational LNP patents with prior art in inter partes review — and mostly lost, leaving Arbutus's wall standing. Both seats teach: how you build a thicket you own, and how you try to tear down a thicket someone else owns.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Wright Brothers Flying Machine — U.S. 821,393
— (patent-prosecution canon) · the pioneer patent / claiming broad on a foundational invention
USPTO (examination) → C.C.W.D.N.Y. → Fed. Cir. predecessor (2d Cir.) · 1903–1914
USPTO examining corps; Hon. John R. Hazel (C.C.W.D.N.Y.)
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~25 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
pioneer-patent
broad-claiming
claim-scope
doctrine-of-equivalents
The original patent war. The Wrights did not patent an airplane so much as a principle — lateral control of a flying machine — and claimed it broadly. That breadth, blessed as a pioneer patent, let them reach Glenn Curtiss's ailerons even though Curtiss had engineered a different mechanism. Played from the applicant's chair: the claim-drafting choice to claim the function broadly rather than the specific wing-warping embodiment, and to keep building on it — the choice that decides whether a foundational invention controls an industry or just one gadget.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Bell Telephone — U.S. 174,465 (the interference with Elisha Gray)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · priority and the interference / the race to the filing window
USPTO (examination / interference) → U.S. Supreme Court · 1876–1888
USPTO examining corps; U.S. Supreme Court (The Telephone Cases)
⚖⚖⚖⚖⚖
~30 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
interference
priority
race-to-file
caveat
Often called the most valuable patent ever issued. Bell's telephone application and Elisha Gray's caveat reached the Patent Office on the same February day in 1876 — the founding drama of priority law. Bell filed a complete application and prosecuted it to a fast grant; Gray filed only a caveat. The difference decided who owned the telephone, and the Supreme Court affirmed it a decade later. Played from the applicant's chair: the priority posture and speed-to-issue choices that, on a foundational invention, are the whole ballgame.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Selden Road-Engine — U.S. 549,160 (Selden/ALAM v. Ford)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · the submarine patent / and the challenger who refused to license
USPTO (examination, 1879–1895) → C.C.S.D.N.Y. → 2d Circuit · 1879–1911
USPTO examining corps; Hon. Charles M. Hough (C.C.S.D.N.Y.)
⚖⚖⚖⚖⚖
~30 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
submarine-patent
prosecution-delay
claim-scope
non-infringement
Two chairs in one story. George Selden ran the archetypal SUBMARINE patent — keeping his automobile application pending sixteen years by amendment so its term would dominate an industry that didn't exist when he filed. Then Henry Ford, refusing to join the ALAM licensing pool, sat in the CHALLENGER's chair and attacked the patent's scope: Selden's claims were tied to the Brayton engine, and the world drove Otto-cycle cars. Ford won on non-infringement. Played from both seats: the prosecution-delay tactic that built the weapon, and the claim-scope attack that broke it.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Gould Laser — U.S. 4,053,845 (the 30-year prosecution war)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · the thirty-year prosecution war / priority, perseverance, and surviving reexamination
USPTO (examination + interference, 1959–1987; reexamination) → Fed. Cir. · 1957–1988
USPTO examining corps; Board of Patent Interferences; PTAB predecessor
⚖⚖⚖⚖⚖
~30 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
priority
interference
notebook-conception
continuation-family
The longest patent-prosecution siege in modern memory. Gordon Gould coined the word 'laser' in a notarized 1957 notebook but filed second, behind Bell Labs, and spent nearly thirty years fighting rejections, interferences, and — once his patents finally issued — a wave of reexaminations mounted by the entire laser industry. He won in the end. Played from the applicant's chair: the priority evidence, the continuation strategy, and the reexamination survival that turn a losing head start into an enforceable fortune — the case for perseverance in prosecution.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Alice Corp. Intermediated Settlement Patents — U.S. 5,970,479 (Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · the §101 kill / challenger's chair and the two-step test that ended the business-method era
D.D.C. → Fed. Cir. (en banc) → U.S. Supreme Court · 1998–2014
Hon. Rosemary M. Collyer (D.D.C.)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~25 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
section-101
software-patent
abstract-idea
business-method
The case that established the two-step §101 test and killed the business-method patent era. Alice Corp.'s patents covered intermediated settlement of financial transactions — running an escrow account — on a generic computer. CLS Bank, facing an infringement suit, argued the patents were nothing more than an abstract idea with a 'do it on a computer' instruction. The Supreme Court unanimously agreed and erected the Alice/Mayo two-step framework: (1) is the claim directed to an abstract idea? (2) if so, does it add an inventive concept beyond the abstract idea itself? Generic computer implementation is never enough. Played from the challenger's chair — the party that forced the test that reshaped an entire field of patent law.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Armstrong FM / Regeneration — U.S. 1,342,885 (Armstrong v. RCA et al.)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · the thirty-year radio war / Armstrong, De Forest, and RCA
USPTO (interference) → N.Y. state/federal courts → U.S. Supreme Court · 1913–1954
Multiple; U.S. Supreme Court (regeneration); various federal courts (FM litigation)
⚖⚖⚖⚖⚖
~30 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
interference
priority
inventor-vs-industry
owner-seat
Edwin Armstrong invented regenerative feedback in 1912 and FM radio in 1933 — two of the most important electronic inventions of the 20th century. RCA and De Forest fought him on regeneration through every appellate level; SCOTUS gave priority to De Forest in 1934, a decision the engineering community universally considered wrong. Armstrong spent the rest of his life fighting for his FM patents against RCA's refusal to license on fair terms. The litigation — and the royalties it withheld — killed him. His widow won after his death. The darkest inventor-vs-industry story in American patent history.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Banting-Best Insulin Patent — U.S. 1,469,994 (University of Toronto, 1923)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · pharmaceutical patent ethics — the $1 assignment and the non-exclusive licensing model
USPTO · 1921–1941
the USPTO examining corps
⚖⚖···
~15 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
biotech
pharmaceutical
pharmaceutical-ethics
non-exclusive-licensing
The patent that could have been a monopoly but wasn't. Frederick Banting and Charles Best discovered insulin in 1921 — a finding that transformed type-1 diabetes from a death sentence into a manageable condition. They assigned the patent to the University of Toronto for $1 each, explicitly so that no one could profit from blocking access to a life-saving medicine. Toronto licensed it non-exclusively and broadly. No continuation thicket. No pricing monopoly. The patent expired in 1941. Played from the owner's chair — but the teaching point runs backward: the optimal move here is to understand when NOT to build a continuation family, and how the $1 assignment and non-exclusive licensing model achieved more than any patent thicket ever could.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Bayer Aspirin Patent — U.S. 644,077 (Felix Hoffmann, 1900)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · patent expiry and trademark genericness — the Bayer Aspirin story
USPTO → S.D.N.Y. (trademark genericness) · 1898–1921
Hon. Learned Hand (S.D.N.Y.)
⚖⚖···
~15 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
pharmaceutical
trademark
genericness
patent-expiry
The story of a patent that expired and a trademark that went generic simultaneously — and what a $1 billion repurchase looks like decades later. Felix Hoffmann synthesized aspirin for Bayer in 1897; U.S. Patent 644,077 issued in 1900. For 17 years Bayer had both the patent and the 'Aspirin' trademark. Then: the patent expired in 1917, WWI asset forfeiture stripped the trademark registration from Bayer in the US, and Learned Hand ruled 'Aspirin' generic in 1921. Bayer spent the next 73 years watching competitors use its trademark freely in the US before buying the rights back for a billion dollars in 1994. In 80 other countries, Aspirin is still a Bayer trademark. The teaching point: patent prosecution is only half the IP strategy — what happens to the brand at expiry matters as much as the claims.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Carlson Xerography — U.S. 2,297,691 (electrophotography, 1942)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · prosecution perseverance / twenty rejections and the patent that became Xerox
USPTO (examination, 1937–1942) · 1937–1960s (licensing)
USPTO examining corps
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
prosecution-perseverance
licensing
independent-inventor
inventor-vs-industry
Chester Carlson invented xerography in a Queens apartment in 1938, building on a disclosure he had filed the year before. The technology was rejected by more than twenty major corporations over the next decade — IBM, RCA, and GE all passed. A small photographic-paper company called Haloid finally took a license in 1947, renamed itself Xerox, and introduced the 914 copier in 1959. The patent, U.S. 2,297,691, became the foundation of a billion-dollar industry. Played from the applicant/licensor chair: prosecution to issue and the licensing decision that finally monetized the invention the world didn't know it needed.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Chakrabarty Oil-Eating Bacterium — U.S. 4,259,444 (Diamond v. Chakrabarty)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · section-101 — 'anything under the sun made by man' / the living-organism eligibility battle
USPTO → C.C.P.A. → U.S. Supreme Court · 1972–1980
USPTO Patent Office Board of Appeals; C.C.P.A.
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~25 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
biotech
section-101
living-organisms
product-of-nature
The case that opened the biotech patent era. GE engineer Ananda Chakrabarty engineered a Pseudomonas bacterium capable of degrading crude oil — useful for spill cleanup. The USPTO rejected the patent under §101: living organisms aren't patent-eligible subject matter. The CCPA reversed. The Supreme Court, 5-4, held that genetically engineered organisms ARE patent-eligible if they are human-made and not naturally-occurring — 'anything under the sun that is made by man.' This holding became the constitutional foundation of the entire modern biotech patent industry. Without it, no Cohen-Boyer licensing empire, no gene patents, no transgenic animals. Played from the owner's chair, defending §101 eligibility against a rejection that threatened to foreclose the entire biotech patent domain.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Cohen-Boyer Recombinant DNA — U.S. 4,237,224 (Stanford / UCSF)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · continuation practice / the foundational biotech licensing empire
USPTO (examination) → Stanford OTL non-exclusive licensing program · 1974–1997
USPTO examining corps
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
biotech
recombinant-dna
continuation-family
licensing-empire
The foundational biotech licensing empire. Stanley Cohen (Stanford) and Herbert Boyer (UCSF) filed the recombinant DNA application in 1974; it took six years to prosecute through an unusual strategy of continuation practice and non-exclusive licensing. Stanford's OTL licensed the family to ~468 companies, generating ~$255M in royalties before expiry in 1997. Two prosecution decisions drove that outcome: how to extend coverage across splicing, transformation, and expression claims through continuation practice, and how to handle obviousness-type double-patenting rejections that came with building the family.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Edison Incandescent Lamp — U.S. 223,898 / Sawyer-Man Priority Fight
— (patent-prosecution canon) · interference / priority fight — who invented first when two labs were racing
USPTO (interference) → C.C. S.D.N.Y. · 1879–1892
Judge William J. Wallace (C.C. S.D.N.Y.)
⚖⚖⚖⚖⚖
~30 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
challenger
interference
prior-art
priority-fight
The most famous priority fight of the Gilded Age. Edison filed U.S. 223,898 in 1879 on his carbon-filament incandescent lamp and built General Electric on it. Sawyer and Man had earlier lamp experiments and their own patent; their assignee attacked Edison's priority with an interference-era validity challenge: we were first, and our work anticipates Edison's claims. The circuit court rejected most of the attack: Sawyer-Man's earlier work disclosed cruder elements but not Edison's specific combination of carbonized bamboo filament, high resistance, high vacuum, and small-filament architecture. Played from the challenger's chair: the prior-art/priority attack and why anticipation requires that the prior art disclose every element of the claimed combination.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Farnsworth Television — U.S. 1,773,980 (Interference No. 64,027 vs. Zworykin/RCA)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · interference priority / the blackboard sketch that beat RCA
USPTO Board of Patent Interferences → Court of Customs and Patent Appeals · 1927–1935
USPTO Board of Patent Interferences
⚖⚖⚖⚖⚖
~30 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
interference
priority
conception
notebook-evidence
Philo Farnsworth conceived the image dissector — the first all-electronic television camera — as a teenager in Idaho, sketching it on a blackboard for his high-school chemistry teacher in 1922. RCA's Vladimir Zworykin had an earlier-filed patent application in 1923. When Interference No. 64,027 was declared, the whole fight came down to a single question under the first-to-invent regime: who conceived first, and can you prove it? Farnsworth's blackboard sketch, corroborated by teacher Justin Tolman decades later, carried the day. RCA paid royalties. The archetypal interference priority story.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Fraunhofer MP3 Audio Coding — U.S. Patent 5,579,430 (Fraunhofer, 1996)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · licensing pools / standards-essential patents and the end-of-life licensing announcement
USPTO (examination) → Fraunhofer/Thomson MP3 licensing program · 1993–2017
USPTO examining corps
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~22 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
audio-coding
standards-essential
licensing-pool
software-patent
Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft and Thomson Multimedia jointly developed and licensed the MP3 (MPEG-1 Audio Layer III) patent portfolio, including U.S. 5,579,430 (digital encoding process for acoustical signals). The licensing program required royalties from every company shipping an MP3 encoder or decoder — from Winamp to hardware manufacturers. The per-unit royalty and per-copy royalty structure generated hundreds of millions in revenue. The program ended when Technicolor announced in April 2017 that all MP3 patents had expired. The successor, AAC, remained under active license. The case teaches standards-essential patent licensing mechanics, the transition from single-patent to pool licensing, and the importance of filing continuation applications to extend a family's effective life as the standard matures.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Gillette Safety Razor — U.S. Patent 775,134 (King Camp Gillette, 1904)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · prosecution strategy / razor-and-blades business model and claim scope
USPTO (examination) → American Safety Razor Co. / Gillette Safety Razor Company commercialization · 1901–1921
USPTO examining corps
⚖⚖⚖··
~18 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
razor-and-blades
business-model
claim-scope
pre-aia
King Camp Gillette filed his safety-razor patent in 1901; U.S. 775,134 issued November 15, 1904. The patent covered the disposable thin-steel blade mechanism — the element that made the razor safe and the replacement blade cheap enough to discard. Gillette's insight was to underprice the razor and profit on blades: the 17-year patent term was the structural constraint that kept competitors from making compatible replacement blades. When the patent expired in 1921, blade prices collapsed within months. The case teaches claim drafting strategy for a consumables-based business model: what you actually need the claims to cover, and what happens when that coverage ends.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Joseph Glidden Barbed Wire — U.S. 157,124 / The Barbed Wire Patent Case (1892)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · prior art attack / the challenger's uphill battle when prior use is oral and corroboration fails
C.C. N.D. Ill. → U.S. Supreme Court · 1874–1892
Justice Henry Billings Brown
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~25 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
challenger
prior-art
prior-use
corroboration
The patent that fenced the American West, and the prior-art attack that failed. Glidden's U.S. 157,124 (1874) on double-strand twisted barbed wire became one of the most commercially valuable patents of the 19th century — licensing it funded the settlement of the Great Plains. Competitors challenged validity with evidence of prior use: farmers and inventors who claimed to have built similar fencing before Glidden. The Supreme Court rejected the challenge in 1892 because prior-use testimony was uncorroborated oral accounts — the rule requiring corroboration for oral prior-art evidence killed the defense. Played from the challenger's chair: a prior-art/prior-use attack, the corroboration rule, and what documentary evidence is needed to win.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Charles Goodyear Vulcanization of Rubber — U.S. 3,633 / Goodyear v. Day (1852)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · claim breadth / the process-patent scope problem — claiming the result vs. the disclosed method
C.C. D. N.J. · 1844–1852
Justice Robert Grier (riding circuit)
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
process-patent
enablement
112b
claim-breadth
The process-patent scope battle. Charles Goodyear discovered vulcanized rubber in 1839 — accidentally, per legend — and patented the process (U.S. 3,633, 1844). Infringers argued his claims were too broad, covering the general principle rather than an enabled specific method. Daniel Webster represented Goodyear at the famous 1852 Trenton trial; Justice Grier upheld the patent, distinguishing 'discovering a principle' from 'inventing a specific enabled process.' The §112 lesson here runs the other direction from Morse: Goodyear's specific process claims — sulfur plus heat in defined proportions — were held adequately enabled and distinct from mere principle claiming. Owner chair: defending the process claim against a breadth/enablement attack.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Google PageRank — U.S. Patent 6,285,999 (Stanford / Google)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · university licensing / continuation strategy and royalty streams
USPTO (examination) → Stanford–Google license agreement · 1998–2011
USPTO examining corps
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
university-licensing
equity-royalty
continuation-family
software-patent
Lawrence Page invented the PageRank algorithm as a Stanford PhD student in 1996. Stanford's Office of Technology Licensing filed the patent application in January 1998, assigned to Stanford. When Google launched, it needed an exclusive license; Stanford negotiated 1.8 million pre-IPO shares instead of a cash royalty — worth roughly $336 million at expiration in 2011. The case teaches the prosecution economics of a university-owned software patent: continuation strategy to preserve claim scope, and the licensing fork between royalty streams and equity. Played from the applicant's (Stanford's) chair.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Elias Howe Sewing Machine — U.S. 4,750 and the 1856 Sewing Machine Combination
— (patent-prosecution canon) · continuation strategy / the first patent pool and how licensing beats scorched-earth enforcement
USPTO → various circuit courts → negotiated Sewing Machine Combination (1856) · 1846–1867
Various circuit court judges; commercial resolution in the Sewing Machine Combination
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
continuation-family
patent-pool
licensing
lockstitch
The first patent pool in U.S. history. Elias Howe patented the lockstitch sewing machine (U.S. 4,750, 1846) — the fundamental mechanical insight that made commercial sewing machines possible. Singer and others built better machines but infringed Howe's foundational claim. The resulting patent war blocked commercial exploitation for everyone until the 1856 Sewing Machine Combination cross-licensed all essential patents at a fixed per-machine royalty. Howe earned roughly $2 million on his patent before it expired in 1867. Played from the owner's chair: the prosecution and licensing strategy that turned a foundational patent into the royalty backbone of an entire industry.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Kearns Intermittent Windshield Wiper — U.S. 3,351,836
— (patent-prosecution canon) · inventor-vs-industry / flash of genius and the $30M vindication
E.D. Mich. → United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit · 1964–1995
Hon. Avern Cohn, U.S.D.J. (E.D. Mich.); Federal Circuit
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~25 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
enforcement
inventor-vs-industry
owner-seat
pro-se
Robert Kearns invented the intermittent windshield wiper after his eye was injured by champagne cork spray on his wedding night — he designed the circuit to mimic the human blink. He patented it in 1967 (U.S. 3,351,836), showed it to Ford and Chrysler, and both automakers rejected him — then introduced the technology in their vehicles a decade later. Kearns spent twenty years in litigation, represented himself for long stretches, and eventually won: Ford settled for $10.1 million; Chrysler was found to infringe and paid $11.3 million. The independent inventor beating the auto industry on obviousness grounds. Played from the patent owner's chair.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Kilby–Noyce Integrated Circuit — U.S. 3,138,743 & U.S. 2,981,877
— (patent-prosecution canon) · the great IC interference / Kilby v. Noyce and who invented the microchip
USPTO Board of Patent Interferences → Court of Customs and Patent Appeals · 1958–1969
USPTO Board of Patent Interferences; Court of Customs and Patent Appeals
⚖⚖⚖⚖⚖
~35 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
interference
priority
conception
inventor-vs-inventor
Two inventors, two companies, one invention — six months apart. Jack Kilby built the first working integrated circuit at Texas Instruments in July 1958 and filed in February 1959. Robert Noyce independently conceived the planar IC at Fairchild in January 1959 and filed in July 1959. Noyce's patent issued first (1961); Kilby's took until 1964. The interference that followed consumed the early semiconductor industry and set the terms for a decade of cross-licensing. Played from the challenger/interference party seat: Noyce's team contesting Kilby's earlier filing date with a superior conception — the classic simultaneous-invention priority war.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Land Polaroid Instant Photography — U.S. 2,543,181 (Polaroid Corp. v. Eastman Kodak Co.)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · patent enforcement / the $900M injunction that ended Kodak's instant film business
D. Mass. · 1948–1990
Hon. Rya W. Zobel, U.S.D.J. (D. Mass.)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~25 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
enforcement
injunction
continuation-family
owner-seat
Edwin Land invented instant photography, filed U.S. 2,543,181 on the diffusion transfer process in 1948, and built a continuation-patent fortress around the Polaroid Land Camera. When Kodak entered the instant-film market in 1976 — betting that the Polaroid portfolio was aging and beatable — Land's patent family was more current and comprehensive than Kodak anticipated. A ten-year litigation ended with Kodak permanently enjoined from making instant cameras and film, forced to refund customers, and paying Polaroid roughly $909 million. The textbook on why a well-prosecuted continuation family is an enforcement weapon.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Marconi Radio — U.S. 763,772 (Marconi Wireless Tel. Co. v. United States, 1943)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · prior-inventor attacks / the challenger's brief in the radio wars
U.S. Court of Claims → United States Supreme Court · 1904–1943
U.S. Court of Claims; U.S. Supreme Court
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~25 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
prior-art-anticipation
priority
challenger-seat
inventor-vs-industry
Guglielmo Marconi held the commanding patent on tuned radio — U.S. 763,772 — and exploited it commercially for decades. But Tesla had published and patented the same four-circuit tuning combination years earlier (U.S. 645,576, 1900), and so had Stone and Lodge. In 1943, the Supreme Court tore the Marconi patent down on anticipation grounds, posthumously vindicating the prior inventors. Played from the CHALLENGER'S chair: the government (and by extension, prior inventors' estates) mounting the prior-art attack that finally killed the claim.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Mary Anderson Windshield Wiper — U.S. Patent 743,801 (1903)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · licensing failure / timing, market readiness, and the patent that expired before the world was ready
USPTO (examination) → Canadian licensing rejection → expiry · 1902–1920
USPTO examining corps
⚖⚖⚖··
~18 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
licensing-failure
timing-risk
market-readiness
womens-inventor
Mary Anderson filed her windshield wiper application in November 1902; U.S. 743,801 issued November 10, 1903. She was inspired by observing a New York City trolley driver who had to stop and manually wipe snow from the windshield. She promptly tried to license the device to a Canadian firm, which told her it had no commercial value. The patent had a 17-year term (pre-1952 Act). Mass-market automobiles with enclosed cabs — the market that would need wipers — did not arrive until after World War I. Anderson's patent expired in 1920, right as automobile production scaled and windshield wipers became standard. She received nothing. The case teaches the hardest lesson in patent strategy: a valid, pioneering patent whose term expires before the market is ready generates zero licensing value.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Prometheus Thiopurine Dosing Patent — U.S. 6,355,623 (Mayo v. Prometheus)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · the §101 kill / challenger's chair and the natural-law framework that preceded Alice
C.D. Cal. → Fed. Cir. → U.S. Supreme Court (×2) · 1998–2012
Hon. James V. Selna (C.D. Cal.)
⚖⚖⚖⚖⚖
~30 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
biotech
section-101
diagnostics
natural-law
The case that established the natural-law framework later incorporated into Alice — and the death knell for broad diagnostic patents. Prometheus held a patent on optimizing thiopurine drug dosing: administer the drug, measure metabolite levels, and observe that certain levels 'indicate a need' to adjust dosage. Mayo Clinic challenged the patents as merely reciting a natural correlation — the relationship between metabolite levels and drug efficacy is a law of nature, and bookending it with conventional steps (administer, measure) doesn't make it patent-eligible. The Supreme Court agreed unanimously: the Mayo two-step framework. Played from the challenger's chair — building the argument that a natural correlation, however useful clinically, cannot be owned.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Monopoly / Lizzie Magie's Landlord's Game — U.S. Patent 748,626 vs. U.S. Patent 2,026,082
— (patent-prosecution canon) · prior art / hidden inventors and the challenger's prior-art attack
USPTO (examination of Darrow application) → Parker Bros. acquisition; no formal interference or IPR · 1903–1936
USPTO examining corps
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~22 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
prior-art
challenger
inventorship
board-game
Lizzie Magie patented 'The Landlord's Game' in January 1904 (U.S. 748,626) — a board game with properties, rents, and a 'go to jail' space, designed to illustrate Henry George's single-tax theory. The game spread through progressive and Quaker communities, was played under different names, and eventually reached Charles Darrow in Atlantic City in the late 1920s. Darrow filed his own patent application and claimed to have 'invented' the game; U.S. 2,026,082 issued in 1935. Parker Brothers acquired Darrow's patent and — crucially — also bought out Magie's patent for $500, with no royalties, to suppress the prior-art narrative. Played from the challenger's chair: what a competent patent practitioner in 1935 could have done with Magie's 1904 patent as prior art.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Samuel Morse Telegraph — U.S. 1,647 / O'Reilly v. Morse (1854)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · claim breadth / the overbroad-claim catastrophe and the §112 lesson that never ages
USPTO → U.S. Supreme Court · 1840–1854
Chief Justice Roger B. Taney
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~25 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
claim-breadth
enablement
112b
natural-law
The foundational overbroad-claim catastrophe. Samuel Morse obtained U.S. 1,647 in 1840 on his electromagnetic telegraph, then obtained a reissue (RE117) in 1848 with claim 8 covering — in words that still haunt patent law — 'the use of the motive power of the electric or galvanic current ... however developed, for making or printing intelligible characters, signs, or letters, at any distances.' The Supreme Court voided claim 8 in O'Reilly v. Morse (1854) because it claimed the principle of electromagnetism for communication, not any specific enabling disclosure. Claims 1-7 survived. The lesson: a claim that outruns the specification's enabling disclosure is void. Played from the applicant's chair — prosecuting the reissue and defending the claim-breadth challenge.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Myriad BRCA Gene Patents — U.S. 5,747,282 & 5,837,492 (Ass'n for Molecular Pathology v. Myriad)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · the §101 kill / challenger's chair and owner's pivot in the gene-patent era
S.D.N.Y. → Fed. Cir. → U.S. Supreme Court · 1994–2013
Hon. Robert W. Sweet (S.D.N.Y.)
⚖⚖⚖⚖⚖
~30 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
biotech
section-101
gene-patents
product-of-nature
The case that ended the genomic-DNA patent era. Myriad Genetics held patents covering isolated BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes and charged ~$3,000 per diagnostic test, creating a monopoly on hereditary breast cancer screening. The ACLU and Public Patent Foundation mounted a §101 challenge: 'isolated' genomic DNA is a product of nature, not markedly different from what exists in the human body. The Supreme Court agreed — unanimously — invalidating the genomic DNA claims while preserving cDNA claims. Played in both chairs: the challenger building the product-of-nature attack, and the owner pivoting to continuation claims on what remains.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
PCR — Mullis / Cetus (U.S. 4,683,202 and U.S. 4,683,195)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · pre-AIA prior-art defense / challenger's chair in the PCR wars
USPTO (examination) → Roche licensing program → Roche Molecular Systems v. Promega Corp. (N.D. Cal.) · 1984–2005
USPTO examining corps; district court (N.D. Cal.)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~25 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
biotech
pcr
nucleic-acid-amplification
licensing-empire
Among the most valuable patents in biotech history. Kary Mullis conceived PCR at Cetus Corp. in December 1983; applications filed 1984–1985 issued in 1987. Cetus sold the PCR rights to Roche for $300M in 1991; Roche licensed them to every clinical diagnostic lab on earth. Two prosecution decisions anchor the teaching: how the prosecution team used pre-AIA antedating tools (37 CFR 1.131 declarations) to swear behind close prior-art references during examination, and how Promega — sued by Roche in 1999 — navigated the pre-AIA forum landscape as a challenger trying to knock out the PCR wall.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
docket ↗
Post-it Note Adhesive — U.S. Patent 3,691,140 (Spencer Silver / 3M, 1972)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · corporate prosecution / the accidentally useful invention and the Information Disclosure Statement ("IDS") duty
USPTO (examination) → 3M internal commercialization · 1968–1989
USPTO examining corps
⚖⚖⚖··
~18 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
corporate-prosecution
adhesive
accidental-invention
ids-disclosure
Spencer Silver invented his micro-sphere acrylic adhesive at 3M in 1968 while trying to make a stronger adhesive — he got a weaker one instead. 3M patented it anyway (U.S. 3,691,140, issued September 12, 1972), not knowing what it was good for. Art Fry, a 3M colleague, applied the adhesive to paper bookmarks in 1974 to keep them from falling out of his hymnal. Post-it notes launched commercially in 1980 after a failed 1978 test launch. The patent covered the adhesive composition; the application — sticky notes — was not claimed or even contemplated at filing. The case teaches corporate prosecution practice: when to patent an invention whose use is unknown, and the IDS disclosure obligations that arise when new information about the invention's utility emerges.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
RSA Public-Key Cryptography — U.S. Patent 4,405,829 (MIT / RSA Security)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · patent expiry / export controls and the open-source endgame
USPTO (examination) → MIT/RSA Data Security licensing · 1977–2000
USPTO examining corps
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~22 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
university-licensing
cryptography
export-controls
public-domain-release
Ron Rivest, Adi Shamir, and Leonard Adleman invented the RSA public-key cryptosystem at MIT in 1977. MIT filed the patent application in December 1977, and U.S. 4,405,829 issued September 20, 1983. MIT licensed it exclusively to RSA Data Security (later RSA Security), which collected royalties until the patent was voluntarily released into the public domain on September 6, 2000 — six weeks before expiration — in a gesture that coincided with SSL/TLS becoming internet infrastructure. The parallel story: U.S. export controls on strong cryptography severely restricted how the patent could be commercially exploited, and the algorithm had already been published (Rivest et al. 1978 MIT Tech Report) before the patent filed, which created a latent prior-art question under pre-AIA law.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Singer v. Howe — The Sewing Machine Prior-Art War (U.S. 8,294 vs. U.S. 4,750)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · prior art / challenging a blocking patent — the challenger's antedating playbook
Various circuit courts; commercial resolution in the Sewing Machine Combination (1856) · 1851–1856
Various circuit court judges
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~25 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
challenger
prior-art
prior-invention
abandonment-bar
The challenger's seat in the sewing machine war. Singer built a commercially superior lockstitch machine but could not freely sell it because Howe's U.S. 4,750 (1846) sat blocking the entire field. Singer's defense was prior art: Walter Hunt built a working lockstitch machine in 1833, more than a decade before Howe. The problem: Hunt never filed for a patent, never commercialized the machine, and essentially walked away from the invention. Courts upheld Howe on the abandonment principle — a prior inventor who abandons, suppresses, or conceals his invention cannot use that prior invention to defeat a later independent inventor. Played from Singer's chair: the prior-art challenge that lost, and why the abandonment bar is the critical limit on antedating attacks.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Tesla System of Transmission — U.S. 645,576 & U.S. 649,621 (1900)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · priority vindication / Tesla, Marconi, and the radio priority war
USPTO (examination, 1897–1900); U.S. Supreme Court (1943, as prior art) · 1897–1943
USPTO examining corps; U.S. Supreme Court (as prior art in Marconi case)
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~20 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
prior-art
priority-vindication
owner-seat
pre-aia
Nikola Tesla filed his 'System of Transmission of Electrical Energy' in 1897, describing four-circuit tuned wireless transmission — the same arrangement Marconi later claimed as his own invention in U.S. 763,772 (1904). Tesla's U.S. 645,576 and U.S. 649,621, issued in 1900, were the prior art that ultimately killed the key Marconi claims at the Supreme Court in 1943. Tesla died six months before the decision that vindicated him. Played from the patent OWNER's chair: how early, well-claimed utility patents create enduring prior-art value — and the prosecution decisions that determine whether your disclosure will be read broadly or narrowly by a court forty years later.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Transistor — U.S. 2,524,035 (Bardeen & Brattain) and U.S. 2,569,347 (Shockley)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · pioneer patents / Bell Labs and the invention of the transistor
USPTO (examination, 1948–1951) · 1947–1956 (invention through licensing program)
USPTO examining corps
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
pioneer-patent
licensing
owner-seat
transistor
Bell Labs held two of the most important patents in 20th-century technology: Bardeen & Brattain's point-contact transistor (U.S. 2,524,035) and Shockley's junction transistor (U.S. 2,569,347), both filed in June 1948 and issued by 1951. Rather than building a patent fortress to exclude competitors, AT&T — under antitrust pressure and with a vision of seeding the electronics industry — offered broad transistor licenses at a $25,000 flat fee in 1952. That decision launched Silicon Valley. Played from the patent owner's chair: the licensing strategy for a foundational technology platform.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Unisys LZW / GIF Patent — U.S. Patent 4,558,302 (Welch / Unisys)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · licensing enforcement / the backlash that birthed an open format
USPTO (examination) → Unisys licensing enforcement program 1994–2003 · 1983–2003
USPTO examining corps
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~20 min
2 forks
patent-prosecution
licensing-enforcement
compression
software-patent
standards-capture
Terry Welch's LZW lossless compression algorithm was published in IEEE Computer in June 1984. The Sperry Corporation (later merged into Unisys) filed the patent application in June 1983, and U.S. 4,558,302 issued December 10, 1985. When CompuServe adopted LZW for the GIF image format in 1987, no one mentioned the patent. In 1994, Unisys announced it would enforce the patent against GIF-using software — triggering a 'Burn All GIFs' internet campaign and the creation of PNG as a royalty-free alternative. Played from two chairs: the owner enforcing a sleeper patent against a widely-adopted standard, and the challenger deciding whether to attack validity or design around.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Velcro — U.S. Patent 2,717,437 (George de Mestral, 1955)
— (patent-prosecution canon) · prosecution strategy / nature-inspired claim drafting and trademark as the long game
USPTO (examination) → Velcro S.A. international portfolio · 1952–1978
USPTO examining corps
⚖⚖⚖··
~18 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
mechanical-patent
nature-inspired
trademark-transition
continuation-family
Swiss engineer George de Mestral filed his hook-and-loop fastener patent in 1951 after noticing how burdock burrs clung to his dog's fur under a microscope. U.S. 2,717,437 issued September 13, 1955 (titled 'Velvet type fabric'). A follow-on patent, U.S. 3,009,235, covered the manufacturing process. Velcro S.A. licensed the patents broadly; when they expired, competitors flooded the market. The long-term asset turned out to be the VELCRO trademark, not the patents — but only because de Mestral had built the brand. The case teaches two lessons: (1) how to draft mechanical claims on a nature-inspired mechanism without losing them to §112 as 'naturally occurring'; (2) the transition from patent exclusivity to trademark exclusivity as the sustainable business strategy.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
George Westinghouse Air Brake — U.S. 88,929 and the Air Brake Patent Family
— (patent-prosecution canon) · restriction and election / the multi-invention disclosure and the divisional family
USPTO · 1869–1880s
USPTO examining corps
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
1 fork
patent-prosecution
restriction
election
divisional
patent-family
The air brake patent family and the restriction-election machinery. George Westinghouse invented the automatic air brake in 1869 (U.S. 88,929) — a system integrating a triple valve, an automatic fail-safe, and distributed car reservoirs. As Westinghouse improved the system and filed additional applications, examiners consistently issued restriction requirements splitting the triple valve, the automatic feature, and the pneumatic distribution system into separate inventions. Westinghouse's counsel used the restriction-election-traverse machinery and the divisional safe harbor (35 U.S.C. 121) to build a patent family covering the full system — protecting each component in a separate patent that carried its own term. Owner chair: navigating the restriction requirement, deciding whether to traverse and how to protect the non-elected invention through a divisional.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
ITC Section 337 Investigations
Certain Opaque Polymers — Dow/Rohm and Haas v. Organik Kimya (Inv. No. 337-TA-883)
— (ITC Section 337 practice) · discovery sanctions, spoliation, and the case-dispositive default
U.S. International Trade Commission (ALJ Hon. Thomas B. Pender) → U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit · 2013–2017 (remedial orders rescinded by settlement, 2026)
Hon. Thomas B. Pender (ALJ)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~30 min
3 forks
spoliation
discovery-sanctions
default-judgment
trade-secret-misappropriation
limited-exclusion-order
Dow, Rohm and Haas Company, and Rohm and Haas Chemicals LLC sued Organik Kimya at the ITC in 2013 over opaque-polymer (paint-additive) technology, alleging patent infringement and — after discovering that former Rohm and Haas employees had defected to Organik — trade-secret misappropriation. The patent claims were narrowed and eventually terminated; the case was decided entirely on the trade-secret theory, and never reached a merits hearing. When ALJ Pender ordered Organik's computers submitted for forensic inspection, at least three Organik employees destroyed the evidence instead — one overwrote a hard drive and backdated its clock, one smashed his hard drive with a hammer and threw it away, one deleted thousands of files and abandoned storage devices at a highway rest stop. Pender entered default as a case-dispositive sanction, jointly and severally against Organik and its counsel. The Commission affirmed the default and issued a 25-year limited exclusion order — extraordinary relief obtained without the underlying trade-secret merits ever being tried — and the Federal Circuit affirmed in full. In 2026 Dow and Organik Kimya settled, and the Commission rescinded the decade-old remedial orders.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Apple's Companion Complaint Against Samsung — Certain Electronic Digital Media Devices and Components Thereof (Inv. No. 337-TA-796)
— (Section 337 / ITC canon) · the companion case: presidential review without a veto, and how inviting full-record Commission review can cost you a win you already had
USITC (ALJ Thomas B. Pender) → Commission review → 60-day USTR Presidential Review → U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (cross-appeals voluntarily dismissed) · 2011–2014
Hon. Thomas B. Pender (ALJ)
⚖⚖⚖··
~22 min
3 forks
presidential-review
limited-exclusion-order
alj-reversal
commission-review
design-patent
Apple's companion complaint against Samsung at the ITC — filed the same summer as the more famous Samsung-v.-Apple FRAND fight (Inv. No. 337-TA-794), decided by the same Commission, reviewed in the same 60-day presidential window, and left standing without a veto. Apple asserted seven patents against Samsung's smartphones and tablets; the ALJ found violation on four, the Commission's own full-record review then reversed two of those four wins, and the surviving exclusion order (on the touch-screen 'heuristics' patent and the headset-plug-detection patent) cleared presidential review intact — only for both sides to voluntarily dismiss their Federal Circuit cross-appeals once Samsung's product redesigns mooted the commercial stakes. Played from both chairs across the case's arc: Samsung's respondent's chair at the ALJ-petition and Federal-Circuit-appeal stages, and Apple's complainant's chair at the Commission-review stage — where chasing a bigger win came with a real cost.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Samsung's FRAND-SEP Complaint Against Apple — Certain Electronic Devices, Including Wireless Communication Devices, Portable Music and Data Processing Devices, and Tablet Computers (Inv. No. 337-TA-794)
— (Section 337 / ITC canon) · the FRAND-SEP veto: patent hold-up policy overrides a final Commission judgment
USITC (ALJ E. James Gildea) → Commission review → 60-day USTR Presidential Review (disapproved) → U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (companion '644-patent appeal) · 2011–2014
Hon. E. James Gildea (ALJ)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~25 min
3 forks
presidential-review
limited-exclusion-order
alj-reversal
sep-frand
commission-review
Samsung sued Apple at the ITC in June 2011 over two UMTS-3G standard-essential patents Samsung had committed to license on FRAND terms. ALJ Gildea's September 2012 Initial Determination found no violation — Samsung's domestic-industry economic prong was satisfied, but the technical prong failed on every asserted patent. The Commission reviewed the ID in its entirety, reversed in part, and on June 4, 2013 found a violation as to one FRAND-encumbered patent, issuing a limited exclusion order and cease-and-desist order against the iPhone and iPad. Then, on August 3, 2013, USTR Ambassador Michael Froman disapproved the exclusion order on patent-hold-up policy grounds — the first presidential veto of an ITC remedy since 1987 — while Samsung's separate Federal Circuit appeal of the one patent it lost outright ended in a bare, unexplained Rule 36 affirmance nine months later. Played from Apple's chair at the confidentiality, presidential-review, and cross-patent-appeal stages of the same investigation whose FRAND-SEP posture, not its raw economic stakes, is what actually moved the White House.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Masimo's Pulse-Oximetry Complaint Against Apple — Certain Light-Based Physiological Measurement Devices and Components Thereof (Inv. No. 337-TA-1276)
— (Section 337 / ITC canon) · the domestic-industry prototype fight: pre-complaint devices, cross-petitions, and a redesign that outlived the exclusion order
USITC (ALJ Monica Bhattacharyya) → Commission review → 60-day Presidential Review (cleared) → U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit · 2021–2026
Hon. Monica Bhattacharyya (ALJ)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~25 min
3 forks
alj-reversal
commission-review
limited-exclusion-order
domestic-industry
presidential-review
Masimo sued Apple at the ITC in June 2021, alleging Apple Watch's blood-oxygen feature infringed pulse-oximetry patents Masimo had spent decades developing and had built into its own pre-complaint 'Masimo Watch' prototype devices. ALJ Monica Bhattacharyya's January 10, 2023 Initial Determination, after a five-day hearing, found a violation on only two claims of one of Masimo's patents while finding several other infringed claims invalid for lack of written description. Both sides cross-petitioned the Commission, which on October 26, 2023 reversed those invalidity findings in Masimo's favor, expanded the violation to four claims across two patents, and issued a limited exclusion order that cleared the 60-day Presidential review window and took effect December 25, 2023 — forcing Apple to pull blood-oxygen sensing from U.S. Apple Watches. Apple's comprehensive Federal Circuit appeal, challenging domestic industry, claim construction, infringement, and validity together, lost on every ground on March 19, 2026. That same day, in a parallel enforcement proceeding testing whether Apple's iPhone-offloaded software redesign infringed, the ALJ found no infringement — and the Commission let that ruling stand in April 2026, ending the case with the exclusion order intact on paper but the redesigned Watch back on U.S. shelves. Played across the ALJ-to-Commission cross-petition fight and Apple's ultimately unsuccessful Federal Circuit appeal: the domestic-industry technical prong — do pre-complaint prototypes, proven up only by testimony and testing records rather than a single physical exhibit, count as a patent-practicing 'article' — is what actually decided this case, not the flashier import-ban headline.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
Amsted's Extraterritorial Trade-Secret Complaint Against TianRui — Certain Cast Steel Railway Wheels (Inv. No. 337-TA-655)
— (Section 337 / ITC canon) · the extraterritorial-reach doctrine: Section 337 reaches trade secret theft that happened entirely in China
USITC (ALJ Carl C. Charneski) → Commission (determined not to review) → U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit · 2008–2011
Hon. Carl C. Charneski (ALJ)
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
3 forks
extraterritorial-trade-secret
domestic-industry-dispute
trade-secret-misappropriation
limited-exclusion-order
commission-review
Amsted Industries licensed its secret 'ABC process' for casting railway wheels to a Chinese firm, Datong. After TianRui Group failed to negotiate its own license from Amsted, it hired away nine Datong employees who disclosed the ABC process to TianRui entirely within China — no act of misappropriation occurred on U.S. soil. TianRui used the stolen process to make wheels, sold and imported into the U.S. through a joint venture with two Illinois companies, Standard Car Truck and Barber TianRui Railway Supply. ALJ Carl C. Charneski's October 16, 2009 Initial Determination, after a 10-day hearing, found a Section 337 violation as to 128 misappropriated trade secrets. TianRui and SCT-Barber petitioned the Commission to overturn the violation finding on two theories — that Section 337 cannot reach wholly extraterritorial conduct, and that Amsted's domestic industry could not be injured by the loss of a process Amsted no longer even practices at home — while Amsted filed a contingent cross-petition of its own. The Commission declined to review any of it, letting Charneski's finding become final by non-review, and issued a 10-year limited exclusion order. TianRui appealed both losing theories to the Federal Circuit, which affirmed 2-1 in TianRui Group Co. v. ITC, 661 F.3d 1322 (2011) — the foundational precedent establishing that Section 337 reaches trade secret theft that happened entirely on foreign soil, over Judge Moore's dissent that the majority had licensed the Commission to police Chinese business practices. Played across the petition-for-review, cross-petition, and Federal Circuit stages of the same investigation that later underwrote import bans against wholly foreign trade-secret theft in cases like Rubber Resins (Sino Legend), 337-TA-849.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
ClearCorrect's Digital-Data Jurisdiction Fight — Certain Digital Models, Digital Data, and Treatment Plans for Use in Making Incremental Dental Positioning Adjustment Appliances (Inv. No. 337-TA-833)
— (Section 337 / ITC canon) · the "articles" jurisdiction limit: purely digital transmissions fall outside what the Commission can ban
USITC (ALJ Robert K. Rogers, Jr.) → Commission review → U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (ClearCorrect's appeal and Align's companion appeal) · 2012–2016
Hon. Robert K. Rogers, Jr. (ALJ)
⚖⚖⚖··
~20 min
4 forks
articles-jurisdiction
alj-reversal
commission-review
cbi-fight
federal-circuit-appeal
Align Technology sued its digital-orthodontics rival ClearCorrect at the ITC in March 2012 over seven patents covering the software and process behind clear dental aligners. The twist: ClearCorrect Pakistan built the infringing digital tooth models entirely offshore and transmitted only data — no physical object — to ClearCorrect's Houston affiliate for 3-D printing and manufacturing. ALJ Rogers's May 2013 Initial Determination held that a purely electronic transmission counts as an imported "article" the Commission can reach, and found a violation on six of seven patents. On Commission review, the April 2014 Final Determination affirmed that jurisdictional theory, flipped the one patent Align had lost, and issued cease-and-desist orders against both ClearCorrect entities. ClearCorrect appealed on the jurisdictional question alone — while still briefing its merits defenses as backup — and won outright: the Federal Circuit held in November 2015 that "articles" means material things, permanently narrowing what the ITC can ever reach, over Judge Newman's lengthy dissent both on the panel and again at en banc denial. On remand, the investigation ended with a finding of no violation. Played across the petition-for-review, cross-petition, and Federal Circuit stages of the one investigation that decided the ITC cannot become an internet-content-blocking body.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
SI Group's Trade-Secret Complaint Against Sino Legend — Certain Rubber Resins and Processes for Manufacturing Same (Inv. No. 337-TA-849)
— (Section 337 / ITC canon) · extraterritorial trade-secret misappropriation: Section 337's reach beyond U.S. borders
USITC (ALJ Robert K. Rogers, Jr.) → Commission review → U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit → certiorari denied, U.S. Supreme Court · 2012–2017
Hon. Robert K. Rogers, Jr. (ALJ)
⚖⚖⚖⚖·
~30 min
4 forks
extraterritorial-trade-secret
limited-exclusion-order
alj-reversal
commission-review
cbi-fight
SI Group, the Schenectady, NY chemical maker, sued Sino Legend and Red Avenue at the ITC in May 2012, alleging the Chinese companies misappropriated more than twenty of SI Group's trade secrets for manufacturing tackifier rubber resins — via a plant manager and other ex-employees poached from SI Group's own Shanghai facility — and used them to produce the SL-1801/SL-1802 tackifier resins later imported into the United States. ALJ Rogers's confidential June 17, 2013 Initial Determination found a violation notwithstanding that every act of wrongdoing occurred entirely inside China; the Commission's January 15, 2014 Final Determination affirmed in part and reversed in part on which process elements independently qualified as protectable trade secrets, then issued a 10-year limited exclusion order — real teeth against conduct with zero U.S. territorial nexus, delivered while a Chinese court's own October 2013 ruling on the identical allegations went the other way. The Federal Circuit summarily affirmed under Rule 36 in December 2015, declining even to write an opinion explaining why TianRui's extraterritorial-reach doctrine and the Commission's refusal to defer to the Chinese judgment survived, and the Supreme Court denied certiorari in January 2017 over an unprecedented Chinese-government amicus brief. Played across both chairs at the CBI-designation, Commission-review, and Federal Circuit stages of the investigation that turned TianRui's abstract holding into a real, decade-long import ban.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
R.J. Reynolds' Heat-Not-Burn Patent Fight Against Philip Morris's IQOS — Certain Tobacco Heating Articles and Components Thereof (Inv. No. 337-TA-1199)
— (Section 337 / ITC canon) · the disciplined petition versus the kitchen-sink appeal: two ways to spend a client's fee budget after an ITC loss
USITC (ALJ Clark S. Cheney) → Commission review → 60-day USTR Presidential Review (cleared without action) → U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit · 2020–2023
Hon. Clark S. Cheney (ALJ)
⚖⚖⚖··
~22 min
3 forks
limited-exclusion-order
presidential-review
domestic-industry-dispute
commission-review
alj-reversal
RAI Strategic Holdings, R.J. Reynolds Vapor Company, and R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company sued Philip Morris and Altria at the ITC in April 2020, alleging that Philip Morris's IQOS heat-not-burn devices and HeatSticks infringed three heating-article patents. ALJ Clark S. Cheney's May 2021 Final Initial Determination found violation on two of the three patents and satisfied domestic industry on all three, based on Reynolds' own domestically manufactured VUSE vapor products — not a licensing theory and nowhere near a FRAND-encumbered standard-essential patent. All three parties petitioned the Commission for review; the Commission granted review of only a fraction of what was asked, modified one claim construction, and on September 29, 2021 affirmed violation, issuing a limited exclusion order and cease-and-desist orders. President Biden let the 60-day Presidential review window close without disturbing it — the mirror-image, non-SEP contrast to the same-summer Samsung v. Apple veto. Philip Morris appealed broadly to the Federal Circuit, which affirmed across the board in a fully reasoned, precedential opinion in March 2023. Played across the Commission-review and Federal Circuit stages of an investigation where the real drama was how narrowly — or how broadly — each side chose to spend its petition and appeal.
OUTCOME SEALED — play the file
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