Source: https://patentlyo.com/hricik/2016/07/octane-malpractice-clients.html
Timestamp: 2019-04-26 05:45:03+00:00

Document:
Octane: Malpractice Claims by Clients Forced to Pay the Other Side's Fees?
Three things have concerned me about Octane.
The second thing — and this does not exactly take a clairvoyant — is that a client who is forced to pay the other side’s fees may sue a lawyer who did not advise the client of that risk. Clients who have been forced to pay fees to their opponents because of state statutes have already done this. E.g., Air Turbine Techn., Inc. v. Quarles & Brady, LLC, 165 So.2d 816 (Fla. Ct. App. 2015) (granting summary judgment to lawyer because advice that client did not likely face fee shifting — under a state statute, not 285 — was reasonable and in good faith at the time the advice had been given).
So, lawyers should be careful to recognize both the “holding back” that might be necessary because of Octane or to have a full discussion with their client about the risks of “going all the way” to the limits of Rule 11. I don’t like the way the law is right now, though I do think as a matter of statutory interpretation Octane was correctly decided.
Unlike other types of sanctions, sanctions under § 285 may not be assessed against counsel—only against a party. Rates Tech. Inc. v. Broadvox Holding Co., LLC, 56 F.Supp.3d 515, 526 (S.D.N.Y.2014) (citing Phonometrics, Inc. v. ITT Sheraton Corp., 64 Fed. Appx. 219, 222 (Fed. Cir. 2003)). As my colleague Judge Scheindlin recently explained, “Generally”, “[w]hen a fee-shifting statute that authorizes the courts to award attorneys’ fees to prevailing parties does not mention an award against the losing party’s attorney [as is the case in section 285], the appropriate inference is that an award against attorneys is not authorized.” Id. n.97 (alterations in original) (quoting Healey v. Chelsea Resources, Ltd., 947 F.2d 611, 624 (2d Cir. 1991)).
Advanced Video Techs. LLC v. HTC Corp., No. 1:11 CIV. 06604 (CM), 2015 WL 7621483, at *5 (S.D.N.Y. Aug. 28, 2015).
One Golden Rule of private practice is (or ought to be): No nasty surprises (for the client of course).
Always was, always will be. So what’s new here?
So the malpractice here is not paying the other side, but rather it is the lack of proper notice of risks, right?
All types of risk are the things that clients must be kept appraised of. This includes any aspect of the fluid legal landscape of the patent world, from taking of property, to the (arbitrary) application of any “Gist/Abstract” sword, to items such as this “refinement” of risk.
I am not seeing this as any per se change in the conversations about risk that need to take place. Risk is fluid and especially now in the extreme uncertainties of Court scrivining and poorly drafted AIA directions.
For “fun,” let clients read the CAFC en banc Alice decision to show the risk and lack of cohesion in the mashed nose of wax.
I think there’s conversations that need to occur… I’m updating one of my books and reading a lot of the fallout from Halo and Octane… it’s becoming a mess.
As for this statute, I can see both sides of how to interpret it. I don’t think the two district court cases, or the weird (really weird) CAFC case they cite to, do the task.

References: v. 
 § 285
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v.