SAN FRANCISCO – On Dec. 14, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California ruled against a motion filed by Amazon, Google and Walmart in a patent infringement case and determined the plaintiff suing them doesn’t have to produce certain documents.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley ruled to deny plaintiff Eolas Technologies Inc.'s motion to compel related discovery in the patent infringement case and to deny the defendants' motion to compel.
Eolas has accused the three companies of infringing on a U.S. patent.
"Defendants Amazon and Google contend that Eolas’ attorneys violated a patent prosecution bar imposed in an earlier action. Eolas admits that it violated the bar as of July 22, 2014 - the date it thought it expired - but denies that it violated before that date. At a hearing in March 2018, Eolas consented to disclosure of its attorney-client privileged communications prior to July 22, 2014, and those communications have been produced," the opinion states.
Still, the defendants wanted the court to compel Eolas to disclose the communications after July 22, 2014. They allege Eolas waived the privilege when it raised harmlessness and good faith when it disclosed the other information.
Scott Corley denied this motion and determined Eolas did not expressly or impliedly waive its attorney-client privileged information for communications after July 22, 2014.
Concerning the express waiver, the court determined Eolas doesn’t have to disclose communications after July 22, 2014 for the sake of fairness.
“The court is persuaded that permitting Eolas to maintain its privilege over the post-July 22 communications does not lead to a selective and misleading presentation of the evidence to defendants’ disadvantage,” the ruling states.
Scott Corley wrote that the defendants don’t explain what having access to the post-July 22 communications would prove, if anything, including if Eolas truly violated the bar before that date.
Eolas wasn’t completely victorious as the court also denied its motion to compel defendants to respond to interrogatories requests.
"...Such discovery is not relevant to Eolas’ objective good faith defense and it seeks attorney-client privileged communications for which there has been no waiver. Given the lack of relevance, no privilege log is required," the ruling states.