Samsung Accuses Foreman Hogan of Misrepresentation 208
sfcrazy writes "Samsung is clearly accusing Hogan in its recent filing of influencing the jury in favor of Apple. Samsung said in its filing: 'Mr. Hogan's own statements to the media suffice if such a showing is required. Once inside the jury room, Mr. Hogan acted as a "de facto technical expert" who touted his high-tech experience to bring the divided jury together. Contrary to this Court's instructions, he told other jurors incorrectly that an accused device infringes a utility patent unless it is "entirely different"; that a prior art reference could not be invalidating unless that reference was "interchangeable"; and that invalidating prior art must be currently in use. He thus failed "to listen to the evidence, not to consider extrinsic facts, [and] to follow the judge's instructions."'"
Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Interesting)
They also allege [arstechnica.com] that Hogan has an old grunge against Samsung because they own part of Seagate (which had sued him into bankruptcy 20 years ago) and that he's a patent-owner himself (and very pro-patent)--neither fact he disclosed during the jury selection process.
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He did disclose the fact he was a patent owner. I don't believe Samsung is claiming he didn't.
Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Informative)
He did disclose the fact he was a patent owner. I don't believe Samsung is claiming he didn't.
Samsung is not claiming he didn't disclose his patent. They are claiming he was pro-patent in a crooked sort of way, by his own admission.
Samsung also suggests that Hogan didn't disclose how pro-patent he was when asked in court whether he had "strong feelings" about the US patent system.
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What difference does it make if he's pro patent or not? Patents exist and they are law. If the courts ignore patents, might as well not have any patents at all. The word "strong feeling" might in fact mean if he's against patents at which point he would not have been selected by Apple's lawyers.
Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Informative)
A person (err, corporation) has the right to an impartial jury (see sixth amendment). If this guy was partial to patent holders, it means Samsung's right to a fair trial was infringed.
Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Informative)
A) If he had answered "yes" to the strong feelings question, the next question would have been "How so?", this isn't a check the boxes test that they take and no one ever looks at.
B) The attitude that Samsung takes issue with is one in which the patent holder is always right simply by virtue of being the patent holder. Patents are law, but that doesn't mean that every accusation made by a patent holder is valid.
C) When you combine B with the influence he reportedly had over the jury during deliberations, you can easily get a situation where a case should be thrown out. Having what is for all intents and purposes a representative of one of the parties interests (since his overlap with theirs) in the jury room, interacting 1 on 1 with the other jurors, even in a position of authority over them (by virtue of being the jury foreman) is poisoning the pool.
If Samsung con convincingly establish that this is what happened they absolutely have a valid case.
Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Insightful)
Especially if it's true about him!
Give me a break already... I own a Galaxy Nexus. It's bogus for Apple to claim this is a copy of an iPhone.
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Really? I have a Galaxy Tab, it's ridiculous for Samsung to suggest otherwise...
I actually have a Galaxy Tab (P1000, 10.1 and 7.7, work has them for testing as well as Ipads and several other Android tab's)
You've got to be certifiably retarded to think it's anything like an Ipad. To begin with, the difference between the 16:9 and 4:3 aspect ratio is a dead give away. Not to mention the Gal Tab's have the giant word "Samsung" on the bezel (or the back) and the fact that the Android lock screen in Honeycomb, Ice Cream Sandwitch and Jelly Bean looks radically different to IOS.
The on
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I think it was known to Samsung that he was a patent other. Being a patent owner doesn't make him pro-patent, and if he was, then Sams
Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Insightful)
The issue is thus:
a) did not disclose fully the extent of his patent dealings, referenced one more recent issue but failed to disclose the more serious prior issues
b) provided false, misleading evidence contrary to judges instructions to manipulate the jury
c) had prior conflict with subsidiary of Samsung
d) was a flat out stupid moron (the latter doesn't affect the case decision, but the first three very much do so)
Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Informative)
There were no such court instructions. The 10 years claim has been thoroughly debunked. Three cheers for transcripts!
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20120923233451725 [groklaw.net]
THE COURT: Okay. Welcome back. Please take a seat. We had a few more departures in your absence. Let's continue with the questions. The next question is, have you or a family member or someone very close to you ever been involved in a lawsuit, either as a plaintiff, a defendant, or as a witness?
Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Insightful)
They asked him for details, he provided incomplete details. Lying by omission is still lying.
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Which he was not required to, since it was more than 10 years prior, as per the (claimed) court instructions.
That was Hogan's excuse. Which was a rather stupid excuse, but that doesn't matter, because it was long after the trial that he made this claim.
The fact is: He was asked whether he was involved in any trial. He said yes, and mentioned a trial that he was involved in. So far everything is fine. At that point, the judge, or the lawyers, or whoever asked the question, should have asked if he was involved in any other trials. That didn't happen.
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"prior conflict with subsidiary of Samsung" years before it was a subsidiary of Samsung.
So what's your point? You think when this subsidiary became a part of Samsung the dude just thought, "oh well, they're owned by a different company now; I'll just let it go."
--Jeremy
Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:4, Insightful)
1. Years before it was a subsidiary doesn't in any way negate holding a grudge.
2. Well, he stated aspects of patents & prior art. Put forth to the jury "expert testimony", which I do consider evidence. While I am sure lawyers would have a bazillion terms to denote nuances. I think in layman's term the use of evidence was a fine term.
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Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Insightful)
Fair enough. What then would a layman call "introduction of testimony from experience(s) outside of the trial to the jury, to directly affect the outcome of the jury's decision" and does that term change if the person responsible for this is the jury foreman?
There is no definition for this because this type of 'evidence' does not exist. Evidence must be presented in court and the introduction of said evidence must follow rules regarding its admission.
At the very least he ignored the judge's orders and should be held in contempt.
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Oh, it exists already. We have his public media testimony to the fact of it's existence.
The issue is, that it judicially is not considered valid evidence or testimony. And that there is the crux of Samsung's gripe.
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Laymen don't have a clue about technology issues, and will go with whoever seems most confident in what they're saying. Put somebody like that, especially somebody like that who doesn't have a clue what the hell he's talking about (seriously, prior art doesn't matter unless it's an exact match and is still in use today?!?), and that person will very definitely influence the outcome of a deliberation.
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No problem with that.
Just don't call that evidence.
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He introduced it to the jury behind closed doors as if it was evidence. That's the crux of the problem.
Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Informative)
However, during the jury selection the judge asked Hogan whether he was involved in any litigation, he answered correctly that he was involved in some litigation a few years ago, and the judge then forgot to ask him if he was involved in any other litigation.
Please do not spout such bullshit. The judge asked everyone if they were EVER involved in any prior litigation. Hogan half-assedly replied that he was involved in 1 litigation; but conveniently and untruthfully left out the Seagate litigation. He claimed in an interview that he did not mention the Seagate litigation because it was more than 10 years past; and that the judge specified a 10-year past limit.
Of course, Hogan was lying through his teeth, and deserves to get booted out; and pay for the cost of the retrial.
Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Insightful)
He deserves a metric fuckton more than that.
He lied through his teeth UNDER OATH, and that is perjury.
I hope Samsung presses criminal charges.
Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Informative)
In the US legal system, individuals do not press criminal charges. Only the state (via the Attorneys General) can do that.
When a victim chooses "not to press charges" what they are really doing is refusing to testify against the suspect. The state still has full discretion as to whether charges will be pressed. Charges are often dropped because the victim's testimony is a large portion of the case.
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Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Informative)
You need to read Samsung's reply, which is in the Groklaw article linked from the page. It answers all your points, and does it in a clear and definitive way. It also makes clear a lot of their other arguments, which you conveniently ignore here; that he indisputably failed to follow the judge's instructions, introducing inaccurate 'expert testimony' of his own that was wrong on just about every point of law that the jury ruled on. It's indisputable because he's been running his mouth off about it ever since.
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You need to read Samsung's reply, which is in the Groklaw article linked from the page.
you're such an idealist! rtfa? that would be a miracle as such :)
Like, why do people blab? (Score:3)
Forget about any legal exposure. Does South Korea have a "Mafia"? I don't think I would want to find out.
Everyone around here seems to play up the Samsumg complaining about sour grapes angle. I want to play up the "just keep one's (fine, fine) mouth shut" angle, especially as a juror post jury trial.
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Dunno. If I were on a jury, I don't think I would try to call attention to myself.
Forget about any legal exposure. Does South Korea have a "Mafia"? I don't think I would want to find out.
Everyone around here seems to play up the Samsumg complaining about sour grapes angle. I want to play up the "just keep one's (fine, fine) mouth shut" angle, especially as a juror post jury trial.
I mostly agree, though the mafia bit is a touch too paranoid even for someone who's paranoid like myself.
Anyway, here's what Samsung said about it, emphasis added:
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Yup. In fact, one of the citations in it quoted some ruling that answering a question in part, but leaving out the parts that you know are likely to lead to qualification, is EXACTLY the sort of thing that constitutes serious juror misconduct.
Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Funny)
They also allege [arstechnica.com] that Hogan has an old grunge against Samsung because they own part of Seagate (which had sued him into bankruptcy 20 years ago) and that he's a patent-owner himself (and very pro-patent)--neither fact he disclosed during the jury selection process.
Well folks, there you have it. The hidden dangers of old grunge; my mother always said it's Satan's music.
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They also allege [arstechnica.com] that Hogan has an old grunge against Samsung
He also smells like teen spirit.
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Well, it sure beats raising cattle.
Re:Samsung's accusations (Score:5, Insightful)
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Even more confusing, why would they rig the jury.. for them to lose?
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I would say they will just have to suck it up and pay up for borrowing ideas.
Pay up for borrowing ideas. I understand the patent system, but you should really hear yourself speak.
If anything he's a plant from their side, imo.
MacDailyNews is over that way...
Not so Fast (Score:4, Informative)
IANAL, but I believe that a lot of what Hogan has said during post-trial interviews cannot actually be submitted to court as evidence? Or at least, the Judge can't use his statements to influence her decision on what to do with him. Can anyone clarify on this?
The stuff about him being sued by Seagate is definitely grounds for a mistrial, though.
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Why not?
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Something about how what goes on in the Jury room is sacred and nobody's supposed to know about it to remain impartial or something?
Re:Not so Fast (Score:5, Informative)
Actually, juror statements after the fact CAN be called into question. While the Court and the litigating parties have no direct sway over what happens inside the deliberation chambers, if the jurors go on public record after the fact, that may cause grounds for further examination of the verdict. It's more accurate to say, what happens in the jury room may only be revealed by the jurors themselves - which they did, in this case. What makes this situation ironic is that Hogan blabbed about it and wouldn't shut up. Had his ego not demanded he talk to the press about it - a lot - and that he stand on his soapbox, Samsung would have had a far weaker argument of juror misconduct.
The bar for proving juror misconduct is very high, and lawyers are usually reluctant to play that card. By going on the record to the media, Hogan is making Samsung's case much, much easier.
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I was hoping that someone would say that and that's good to know. I think anyone paying attention to this case can see it's clearly juror misconduct, but knowing that it's hard to prove is worrying.
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I thought that was only during the trial. Not afterwards.
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The jury cannot be compelled to discuss what went on in the jury room. He voluntarily flapped his gums about it to anyone who would listen.
Vermin Hogan? (Score:5, Insightful)
Some of the statements he made after the trial, he seemed to be enjoying the limelight until he realised what a hole he was digging and seemed to shut up. I was mind-blown.
He actually seemed proud, of the fact that he was able to convince the other jurors that they could ignore the "prior art" arguments because they were "bogging us down".
He stated very matter of factly, that the trial was over from day one when Apple presented their "smoking gun" which, in fact, turned out to be quite the opposite to anybody who actually READS the thing now that the unredacted documents are available, and didn't just look at Apple's cherry-picking and assumption leaping.
He ignored the judge's instructions as to how to calculate the award amount (and seemed quite proud of the 'punishment' he awarded (paraphrasing because I can't be bothered to look it up): "I approached it by thinking, what if these were MY patents", and "so we made an appropriately painful award").
The award amount itself was sent back to the jury room how many times, because they couldn't do simple arithmetic (and such was their hurry to get out of there, they awarded a few tens of millions even for things they said DIDN'T infringe).
The whole trial was a farce... Declaring mistrials is very uncommon but this travesty needs to be one of the exceptions.
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Very curiously... (Score:5, Insightful)
it was Apple which probed Samsung's timing of their knowledge about Hogan's past.... a question which they themselves failed to answer when Samsung's lawyers filed a rebuttal. Very strange... looks like Apple could get hoisted by their own petard... and rightfully so!
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it was Apple which probed Samsung's timing of their knowledge about Hogan's past.... a question which they themselves failed to answer when Samsung's lawyers filed a rebuttal. Very strange...
Not strange at all... Apple isn't claiming Hogan is biased, so they have no need to provide evidence of when they had knowledge about his past activities, since that knowledge is irrelevant, as far as their claims are concerned. On the contrary, Samsung is claiming Hogan is biased, and if they knew about his past activities before trial and waited to play it as a card if they lost, then that may mean that they've waived the opportunity to bring it up now.
Or, to put it another way - if (A) either party knew
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Yes, but Apple is claiming that Samsung is in the wrong for not mentioning the Seagate trial earlier, so that opens the case that Apple also knew about it earlier, and should have mentioned it so that a different juror could be called.
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Yes, but Apple is claiming that Samsung is in the wrong for not mentioning the Seagate trial earlier, so that opens the case that Apple also knew about it earlier, and should have mentioned it so that a different juror could be called.
Not at all... If Apple doesn't think Hogan is biased, then they had no duty to mention the suit. Furthermore, Apple has no duty to presume that Samsung would find him biased and mention it. That's Samsung's job, and if Apple were making assumptions for them, we'd be rightly outraged. Apple can only act in their own name, and if they didn't think his Seagate suit biased him, then they had no reason to raise it.
Re:Very curiously... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Very curiously... (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually, my understanding was that after the case was over, and names of jurors were out in the public. The spouse of a lawyer recognized his name from a prior case. And that's what triggered the revelation...
So not sure how that wasn't answered?
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Will you elaborate?
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they deserve a big mac with medium wedgies and a pepsi.
nothing in it is deserving protection, given all devices done prior to it.
Re:Very curiously... (Score:5, Insightful)
None. And yes, it should be okay.
Did you actually read the memo? It looked like UI design 101, they just happened to (unfortunately) use the iPhone as the example of how it could be done right.
It had such amazingly original nuggets such as:
- increase the size of the daily schedule to make it legible
- Don't allow duplicate icons to be placed on the home screen
- Don't allow the keyboard to overlap the text entry screen
- Reduce the number of steps required to toggle Wi-Fi
These are the basis of a patent?
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Well considering how almost all of the iPhone copied Palm, Prada and others...
How much do you think Apple should be paying Palm right now?
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Foreman Hogan?? (Score:2, Funny)
Wait, George Foreman and Hulk Hogan have been made into a Composite abomination of some kind?
Are they trying to sell the George Foreman and Hulk Hogan Combination Grill and Hair dryer or something?
Slashdotter? (Score:5, Funny)
Once inside the jury room, Mr. Hogan acted as a "de facto technical expert" who touted his high-tech experience to bring the divided jury together.
So, he talked out of his ass.
He must be a regular here on Slashdot! And he probably has karma out the Yin Yang to boot!
Who IS a lawyer here? (Score:5, Interesting)
1. Why didn't Samsung's lawyers know every detail about every potential juror? Is that not allowed in this court? Did each side not get to ask questions of each potential juror?
2. How much of the jury's actions are protected and how much are not?
3. Are Apple's lawyers required to share everything they find out about the case in their own digging with the opposition?
Re:Who IS a lawyer here? (Score:5, Interesting)
Samsung's Laywers only knew as much about the Jurors as the Jurors themselves disclosed. Any further investigation of the Jurors could be considered jury tampering. More importantly, the Jury's actions are only protected if they are taken within the law. If a juror's actions are illegal, they have no protection.
Now, in this case I don't think that the Foreman's actions were necessarily illegal, and as such I doubt he can be prosecuted or sued for them, but they do raise a number of questions about the propriety of the verdict and damage award. My guess is that there are two things that could result from this:
1) The verdict could be overturned and a new trial ordered. At this point, the jury is irrevocably tainted and replacing the foreman with an alternate and re-deliberating is just not an option.
2) The foreman may be held in contempt by the judge - I'm not sure what legal grounds the judge actually has to do this, but I know that if the case ends up having to be retried because of the foreman's actions, it will SERIOUSLY piss off the judge. And if there's one thing you DON'T want to do, it's piss off a judge in their own courtroom.
I suspect that the verdict will be overturned, as it's becoming clear that there are compelling arguments that the law was not followed, and thus allowing it to stand will weaken the judicial system as a whole. What would be interesting is if the judge decides somehow that Apple should have known that the foreman was tainted and withheld that information from the court, and as a result the judge decides to not only overturn the verdict, but reverse it and find in favor of Samsung. I doubt that would stand up to an appeal though, so I expect that won't happen, but you never know...
Re:Who IS a lawyer here? (Score:5, Informative)
I'm not a lawyer, but Groklaw answers a fair amount of this. I've also sat on a jury before, if that makes any difference.
1. This is one of the points being argued. The gist of Samsung's arguments is that there is a legal standard that believes that a prospective juror under oath is to be believed unless there is reason not to believe. The threshold for breaching a prospective juror's privacy is much higher than that for breaching an interested party's. Jury selection is long and complicated as it is. When a juror says, "I was involved in 1 lawsuit involving XYZ" and there is no apparent need for follow-up on other suits, lawyers typically won't follow up. There is trust that jurors will be forthcoming, because they took an oath that they would be forthcoming.
2. "Protected" is a complicated word. Basically, the Court issues instructions to the jury, and trusts that the jury will abide by those instructions. It requires an extraordinary level to prove that a jury acted outside the bounds of the Court's instructions. It's one thing if the jury's verdict doesn't jive with what the Court thinks it should be. It is another matter entirely when there is evidence of willful misconduct by a juror. Basically, if it can be demonstrated that a juror was willfully disregarding jury instructions or otherwise was acting as an "interested party", that juror could face sanction from the court, including the possibility of having to pay at least some of the costs. It essentially comes down to jury tampering. The bar for proving this is very high, but a juror's own words after the trial can be used against him or her.
3. This is also a complicated question. Lawyers want to win, yes, but they also have a fairly rigorous set of legal ethics to which they must adhere. This is a civil trial, so they are not under the same burden a criminal prosecutor is. Apple doesn't need to make Samsung's case for Samsung. At the same time, anything they plan to introduce at trial needs to pass through Samsung first so that Samsung may object or present a defense. Cases like this have very few "Aha!" moments. They have TONS of filings, briefs, depositions, cross-depositions and so forth. The court's job is to make sure the trial is fair and that both sides get their say. That said, if Apple had prior knowledge of juror bias, they did have a legal obligation to make the Court aware of this bias.
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1. This is one of the points being argued. The gist of Samsung's arguments is that there is a legal standard that believes that a prospective juror under oath is to be believed unless there is reason not to believe. The threshold for breaching a prospective juror's privacy is much higher than that for breaching an interested party's. Jury selection is long and complicated as it is. When a juror says, "I was involved in 1 lawsuit involving XYZ" and there is no apparent need for follow-up on other suits, lawyers typically won't follow up. There is trust that jurors will be forthcoming, because they took an oath that they would be forthcoming.
But, contrary to what an AC said above, Samsung was certainly entitled to research the juror, and certainly due diligence would include seeing if his name was a party to a lawsuit.
The bigger question here was whether Samsung did that research, and whether they knew about the Seagate suit pre-trial. If they did, and they sat on that information in case of a losing verdict, then they may have waived any opportunity to bring it up now... unlike the movies, you don't get to keep cards up your sleeves in litiga
Re:Who IS a lawyer here? (Score:5, Informative)
"due diligence would include seeing if his name was a party to a lawsuit"
...which doesn't work very well if the case records are no longer available to be found, as Samsung point out in their filings. The only reason anyone knows about the Seagate case is one lawyers personal recollection and Hogan incriminating himself, both occurring after the trial.
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Exactly who 'entitled' Samsung to investigate jurors?
And no, they should not have to do that. They should not even be allowed to do that. There was no reason for Samsung to think that the juror was lying, unless you are prepared to say that ALL potential jurors in ALL potential cases should be considered liars, deserving off full background checks just because they MAY be called on to perform their civic duty.
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Exactly who 'entitled' Samsung to investigate jurors?
The [americanbar.org] courts [nelsonmullins.com].
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We need some real answers, not AC speculation.
1. Why didn't Samsung's lawyers know every detail about every potential juror? Is that not allowed in this court? Did each side not get to ask questions of each potential juror?
2. How much of the jury's actions are protected and how much are not?
3. Are Apple's lawyers required to share everything they find out about the case in their own digging with the opposition?
A couple things from Samsung's submission:
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Oops, forgot to clarify, IANAL, YMMV, etc. ad nauseam...
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The juror is a minor part of the submission (Score:5, Interesting)
Reading through Samsung's submission over at Groklaw, the whole juror misconduct is a rather minor part.
It goes on for pages about Apple's arguments during trial and disputes their claims, for example:
It goes on like this for pages and makes a very compelling argument.
A problem with the jury system (Score:5, Insightful)
Picking random yahoos off the sidewalk, making sure they're sufficiently clueless/pliable, then subjecting them to a barrage of conceptually complex technical and legal points, from experts and lawyers from top schools and companies, and expect them to come to reasonable and accurate conclusions.
Imagine doing medicine or bridge/building design the same way.
This might have worked for a low tech agrarian society. But it is not a reliable decision-making system today. The jury system is at best cute and quaint, but certainly not a reliable way to reach accurate and reasonable conclusions.
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One problem with limiting the jury to people sharing the profession of the accused is that the jury might be overly sympathetic to the accused. Imagine a group of doctors hearing evidence of possible malpractice. They might weigh the evidence fairly, but they might also feel sympathy for the accused, remembering times when they were in similar situations, and give them the benefit of the doubt.
Another issue would be them applying their own knowledge of the field instead of limiting their deliberations to
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The problem is that often juries do not often have the training in technical and legal matters which would let them come to accurate and reasonable conclusions.
You have top litigation expert lawyers from Harvard and Yale, and technical experts from top tier tech companies arguing with each other. And a high school graduate, or even dropout
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OK, the plan for corp-to-corp lawsuits.
1) Pick 12 random CEOs/other top executives (random choice weighted by company market cap)
2) Sequester them for the length of the trial, allowing no contact with their companies (a few months at a time?)
3) Only pay them standard jury pay for their time.
4) laugh as random corps become leaderless randomly.
In his own words.. (Score:2)
His own words to the press make it clear he deceived the rest of the jury.
Re:Well duh (Score:5, Interesting)
I dunno about paying costs, that would leave him in RIAA-style life long debt. But a reasonable contempt of court fine could be justified -- though I don't know if that is legal. In many ways jury nullification is a positive thing, but in this case it seems to have swung the other way completely (assuming Samsung's accusations are true).
Re:Well duh (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Well duh (Score:4, Insightful)
One way you could look at this that at least feels consistent to me is that jury nullification should work in only one direction. If we still feel comfortable with the idea that "better ten guilty men go free than one innocent man go to jail," then criminally we should only use jury nullification to err on the side of a lesser punishment and, if we want to use the concept of jury nullification for civil trials (and, certainly, the RIAA and MPAA lawsuits incline me to do so), we should also only use jury nullification to lower but not increase damages.
If we were to use that logic, in this case it'd mean that we'd be erring on the side of letting Samsung off, because "'rounded corners' is a stupid patent."
Nullification is the solution to nullification (Score:2)
IMHO an interesting factor here is that we're talking about one (possibly dishonest) fuckwit. What about the other eleven jurors? Part of the reason for an independent jury is to be able to stand up to the government (I agree!) but another reason for a jury is that it is multiple people, so like elections themselves, fringes should get marginalized. If a judge has a bad day there is no check against that except (maybe!) appeals. If a juror has a bad day, there are supposedly eleven checks against that.
I
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The nice part about Jury Nullification is that you don't need to draw the line. By definition, it's invoked at a trial when the specifics are put into play, so there's no need for generalized guidelines since you're already sweating the details when you get there.
Re:Well duh (Score:4, Insightful)
In many ways jury nullification is a positive thing...
Don't get confused about this. This has nothing to do with "jury nullification". Jury nullification is a very specific and very limited situation. It is your right not to give a criminal conviction to a person who you believe is actually guilty according to the law or who you are told is guilty by the judge. In other words, it is that you can't be forced to give a guilty verdict which you would consider to be deeply morally wrong.
This doesn't give the jury the right to decide anything they want. For example, in a criminal trial you can give a not guilty verdict even if you think the person probably did break the law. You cannot, however, give a guilty verdict if you think the person didn't do the crime but probably did something else bad.
In a civil trial, the jury should only decide what they think is most likely to be true. There's no opportunity for jury nullification since there's no guilty verdict available at all.
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How is a civil judgement any better than a guilty/not-guilty verdict? You could potentially face civil damages that would ruin the rest of your life. In the case of OJ Simpson, you have the cloud of "He definitely murdered his wife, or he wouldn't have been found guilty of the civil charges." Maybe OJ did it, and maybe he didn't. But his life is forever ruined by that jury verdict (though lets be honest it was probably ruined as soon as they arrested him, since it was so high profile). The point is tha
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To hell with contempt of court.
How about perjury charges?
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Apparently you're not aware that jury oath does NOT require him to tell the truth, the whole truth, so help him, God?
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How does god come into this? Does it mean an atheist can legally lie to the court?
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"You swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God" is the saying.
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But if you don't take that oath does it in any way relieve you of your obligation to tell the truth in court? Probably not.
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Legally? Yes, absolutely.
If you're not under oath to tell the truth, then you don't have to tell the truth.
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Actually, the last time I was in voir dire, I was asked to take an oath to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth before we were questioned.
I was later asked if I would be willing to swear an oath to judge only the facts and not the law. I was dismissed when I indicated that I couldn't swear to that.
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That's just it, he didn't nullify, he amplified.
There are subtleties involved. He actively manipulated other jurors by providing them with a broken interpretation of current law contrary to instructions. True nullification is when you simply vote 'not guilty' and leave it at that.
Re:Well duh (Score:5, Funny)
Duh, he couldn't even get out of Jury duty.
Re:Well duh (Score:4, Interesting)
next time I get called in, I will waste no time with the stupid voire dire. I'll just hand them a card that says 'no, I won't blindly follow any judge's instructions, I vote my concience and I fully support jury nullification.'
I bet I'll be allowed to leave in 5 minutes flat.
(I'd prefer to be allowed to use JN but they won't allow it, sigh)
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Repeat: 'I refuse, on religious grounds, to stand in judgement of anyone.'
The best thing about that: if the judge so much as say boo, you have a federal civil rights lawsuit against the county/state.
Re:Well duh (Score:5, Insightful)
Or you could, you know, DO YOUR CIVIC DUTY and not try to get out of jury duty.
Tired of "idiots" on juries? Serve on one yourself.
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They won't impanel me anyhow. Lawyers hate engineers on Juries.
Besides which, if they want my time, they can pay for it. Same as they pay for the prosecutor, bailiff and judge's time.
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They won't impanel me anyhow. Lawyers hate engineers on Juries.
Anyway, I believe Velvin Hogan is an engineer - Samsung might not be regretting having him there (now), although it could be argued things would've turned out much better if they had someone smarter.
The famous (in these parts) Terry Childs (SF Network Admin) trial that had an engineer [slashdot.org] on it, and he posted on Slashdot about it [slashdot.org]. He seemed a few degrees smarter than Hogan.
Besides which, if they want my time, they can pay for it. Same as they pay for the prosecutor, bailiff and judge's time.
Well, if that's your opinion of civic duty maybe you should be taxed more to pay for jurors' to be impaneled, seeing as you're too (valuabl
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Jury duty can present a significant financial hardship for many hourly workers and commissioned salespeople. The per diem jurors get is a joke.
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By worked i mean i was not allowed on the Jury, the quotes was because i am happy to do my Citizens duty and be on a Jury.
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Said the Anonymous Coward. Another classic, sensational Anonymous Coward comment. Let this serve as an example, as if we needed more.