Malpractice

Should A U.S. Federal Court Hear A Foreign Patent Malpractice Case Arising Under Foreign Law?

“What do you mean ‘my patent lapsed?’ You said You Were Going To Pay The Maintenance Fees.” – Anonymous Client The failure to pay a maintenance fee when you agreed to do so can be a lawyer’s worst nightmare.  The nightmare can be made even worse when, according to the patent owner, the patented technology is so […]

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Black Friday Comes Early: $4.95 Flat-Rate Legal Service Raises Ethical Concerns

Attention all shoppers.  Legal fees now at deeply discounted prices.  The ABA and a cloud-based computing service have launched a new fixed-price program to provide on-demand legal advice for small businesses.  The price? A flat rate of $4.95.  That is not a typo. In a Thursday press release, the ABA and Rocket Lawyer announced that they have begun testing ABA Law Connect in Illinois,

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“What We’ve Got Here Is Failure To Communicate”  – Preventing The Most Common Cause For Attorney Discipline And Malpractice

It is one of the most iconic lines in the history of American cinema.  Spoken by “The Captain”–the sadistic prison warden portrayed in the 1967 film Cool Hand Luke—the “failure to communicate” passage near the top of the American Film Institute’s list of top 100 movie quotations, nestled between “I love the smell of napalm

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Law Firms Tell Mass. Supreme Court No Subject Matter Conflict In Patent Prosecution Unless Claims “Identical” Or “Mere Obvious Variants”

On August 20, 2015, eleven law firms filed a joint amicus brief in the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts in Maling v. Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner.  In Maling, the Massachusetts high court requested amicus briefing on whether Finnegan Henderson’s concurrent representation of two different clients who were allegedly seeking patent protection at the

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District Court Tells IP Firm “Don’t Ask Alice,”Confirms $8 Million Malpractice Award For Bungling Patent Application

A federal judge in New York rejected an intellectual property firm’s attempt to rely on the Supreme Court’s 2014 Alice decision as grounds to set aside a jury’s multi-million dollar verdict for mishandling a client’s patent application.  In denying post-trial motions, U.S. District Judge Pamela Chen ruled that Virginia law firm Antonelli Terry Sout & Kraus LLP forfeited

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Mass. Sup. Ct. Schedules Oral Argument on Subject Matter Conflicts in Patent Prosecution

How close is too close?  That is a question that has perplexed patent attorneys who prepare and prosecute patent applications for multiple clients in the same, or similar, fields of technology.  At least one state appeals court has decided to take this question head on. As previously reported in our January 2, 2015, posting, the Justices of

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Massachusetts Supreme Court To Tackle Thorny Issue Of Subject Matter Conflicts In Patent Prosecution

On December 26, 2014, the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts issued the following Announcement in an appeal pending before the court: ANNOUNCEMENT: The Justices are soliciting amicus briefs. Whether, under Mass. R. Prof. C. 1.7, an actionable conflict of interest arose when, according to the allegations in the complaint, attorneys in different offices of the

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After the Protostorm – Court Restricts Intellectual Property Firm’s Spending Following $8 Million Malpractice Judgment

In the wake of a multi-million patent malpractice verdict against Antonelli Terry Stout & Kraus LLP, a federal judge has imposed “temporary” financial restrictions on the Virginia-based IP firm. Protostorm LLC et al. v. Antonelli Terry Stout & Kraus LLP, No. 1:08-cv-00931 (E.D.N.Y.) As discussed in our October 13, 2014 post, Protostorm LLC engaged the Antonelli firm

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