Jury & Judge Put the (Spinal) Screws to Medtronic

Posted on | March 21, 2008 | No Comments

2008-1240 Depuy Spine v. Medtronic Sofamor
D/MA  01-CV-10165

Defendant Medtronic appeals from final judgment and Judge Edward Harrington’s denial of a bevy of motions including JMOL.  Depuy et al asserted 5,207,678 directed to pedicle screws and receiver members used in spinal surgeries.  In an earlier appeal to the CAFC, certain claim construction was determined, some of the accused products were found to not infringe, and the matter remanded to trial as to doctrine of equivalents.

The jury found that Medtronic’s products infringed the ’678, rejecting invalidity arguments.

Note: After the Notice of Appeal was filed, Judge Harrington entered sanctions against Medtronic, finding:

The defendants prolonged the proceedings unnecessarily (thus unduly imposing upon the jury’s time), they sought to mislead both the jury and the Court, and they flouted the governing claim construction as set forth by the Federal Circuit. Under these circumstances, the Court concludes that it is proper to impose a penalty of ten million dollars.3

3Although this sum is not based directly upon the damages assessed by the jury in this case (about 226 million dollars), it does bear some relation to that amount. The sanction reflects not only to the magnitude of the malfeasance, but also the need to provide a disincentive for such conduct in the future. Where the amount in controversy in a case is large (as was the case here), the prospective penalty for litigation misconduct, if it is to serve the purpose of deterring that conduct, should also be large. Cf. Fed. R. Civ. P. R. 11(c)(2) (“A sanction imposed for violation of this rule shall be limited to what is sufficient to deter repetition of such conduct or comparable conduct by others similarly situated.”).

Update: Depuy has filed a cross-appeal, 2008-1253.

Comments