Latest 2 Cases This Week: John Bean Technologies Corp. v. Morris & Associates, Inc. (Fed. Cir.), SynQor, Inc. v. Vicor Corp. (Fed. Cir.)

Death Penalty Opponents Should Rethink Their Support for Life Without Parole Sentences

AUSTIN SARAT

Austin Sarat—Associate Provost and Associate Dean of the Faculty and Professor of Jurisprudence & Political Science at Amherst College—argues that life sentences without the possibility of parole (LWOP) are as problematic and damaging as the death penalty. For this reason, Professor Sarat calls upon death penalty opponents to reconsider their support for LWOP sentences.

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John Bean Technologies Corp. v. Morris & Associates, Inc.

Court: US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit

Docket: 20-1090

Opinion Date: February 19, 2021

Judge: Jimmie V. Reyna

Areas of Law: Intellectual Property, Patents

Bean’s patent, issued in 2002, covers an auger-type poultry chiller. Days after the patent issued, Bean’s only domestic competition, Morris, wrote a demand letter, arguing that the patent was invalid and citing prior art. Morris received no response and proceeded to develop and sell chillers that included features described in the Bean patent. About 11 years later, Bean requested ex parte reexamination of its patent. After John Bean amended and added claims, the Patent and Trademark Office issued a reexamination certificate; six weeks after receiving that certificate, Bean filed suit, alleging that Morris infringed the patent once the reexamination certificate issued. The Federal Circuit affirmed partial summary judgment in favor of Morris. A defendant, accused of infringing a reissued patent, may raise the affirmative defense of equitable intervening rights, 35 U.S.C. 252, and may be protected from liability for infringement of substantively and substantially altered claims in a reissued patent. Granting equitable intervening rights is a matter of judicial discretion. Once granted, they give the alleged infringer the continued right to manufacture, sell, or use the accused product after the reexamination certificate is issued “when the defendant made, purchased, or used identical products, or made substantial preparations to make, use, or sell identical products, before the reissue date.” The public has the right to use what is not specifically claimed in the original patent.

SynQor, Inc. v. Vicor Corp.

Court: US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit

Docket: 19-1704

Opinion Date: February 22, 2021

Judge: Todd Michael Hughes

Areas of Law: Intellectual Property, Patents

SynQor’s 190 patent issued in 2006, as part of an extensive family of patents that disclose technology for DC-DC power converters used in large computer systems and data communication equipment to convert direct electric current from one voltage to another. In 2011, SynQor asserted several patents against Vicor. Vicor petitioned for reexamination of the 190, 702, and 290 patents. The Patent Trial and Appeal Board affirmed that claims of the 702 patent were not unpatentable, finding that “there are incompatibilities in frequency between” prior references Cobos and Steigerwald, and found the challenged claims of the 290 patent not unpatentable based on a combination of Steigerwald, Cobos, and another reference. The Federal Circuit court affirmed the patentability of the claims of the 290 patent and the finding the 702 patent not unpatentable but did not reach the finding that Steigerwald and Cobos were incompatible. The 190 patent expired in 2018. A year later, the Board issued its decision in the 190 reexamination, rejecting SynQor’s argument that Steigerwald and Cobos had incompatible frequencies. The Federal Circuit vacated. Common law issue preclusion arising from the 702 and 290 reexaminations collaterally estopped the Board from finding that an artisan would be motivated to combine Steigerwald and Cobos. The Board’s decision on newly presented claims 34–38 became moot with the patent's expiration.