Opinion ID: 741849
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Interpretation of the mandate in Laitram II

Text: 15 Upon return of its mandate, the district court cannot give relief beyond the scope of that mandate, but it may act on 'matters left open by the mandate.'  Caldwell, 824 F.2d at 767 (quoting Sanford, 160 U.S. at 256, 16 S.Ct. at 294). Therefore, the critical question in determining whether the district court had the power to hear and decide the motions for JMOL on remand, is what issues were left open by the mandate. 16
17 In its order, the district court properly noted that a district court must strictly obey the mandate of a circuit court of appeals. Laitram Corp. v. NEC Corp., No. 89-1571, slip op. at 3 (E.D.La. Dec. 26, 1995) (slip opinion). The district court held that the mandate to reinstate the jury's verdict was clear and obvious on its face. Slip opinion at 4. The court reasoned that the mandate must have intended for the entire jury verdict, including the findings on willfulness and claim identicality, to be reinstated because (1) [h]ad the Federal Circuit intended for the Court to reinstate only a portion of the verdict and conduct further proceedings consistent with its mandate it could have done so, id.; (2) the denial of NEC's requests for clarification in light of this Court's proposed intention to reinstate the entire jury verdict provides further evidence that the Federal Circuit meant just that, id.; and (3) the willfulness and claim identicality issues were decided in Laitram II by implication. 18 At the outset, in all fairness to the district court, we appreciate the dilemma in which the court found itself on remand. Indeed, the district court's actions on remand should not be inconsistent with either the letter or the spirit of the mandate. Quern v. Jordan, 440 U.S. 332, 347 n. 18, 99 S.Ct. 1139, 1148 n. 18, 59 L.Ed.2d 358 (1979). While the district court's interpretation of our mandate was reasonable, particularly in light of our refusal to clarify the issue when asked, the district court's reasoning was in error. As to the first reason proffered by the district court, while this court could have remanded with explicit instructions to decide the JMOL motions, the failure to do so is not dispositive. As to the second reason, the requests for clarification did not, as the district court suggests, disclose the district court's intention to reinstate the entire jury verdict. Rather, the requests set out only the arguments of the two parties. Thus, the denials carry no inferential weight. As to the third reason, the assertion that the issues were decided by implication is a conclusion based only on the first two reasons. Furthermore, even if we were to agree that the issues somehow could have been implicitly decided, the district court misstates the rule limiting trial court power over issues decided by implication by an appellate court. 19 Although the district court cites much authority for the proposition that issues decided implicitly by courts of appeals may not be reexamined by the district court, the rule is actually applicable only to those issues decided by necessary implication. See, e.g., Conway v. Chemical Leaman Tank Lines, Inc., 644 F.2d 1059, 1062 (5th Cir.1981). In Laitram II, this court was solely reviewing the propriety of the grant of a JMOL of non-infringement. The willfulness and claim identicality issues were not antecedent to deciding the infringement issue, either logically or legally; indeed, they were the subject of separate JMOL motions, the denials of which were not appealed. Nor could the denials have been appealed, for the motions were never decided on their merits by the trial court which simply denied (really, dismissed) them as moot. Thus, the decision by implication rule cited by the district court is inapposite.
20 Having concluded that the trial court misinterpreted our mandate in Laitram II, we now turn to the correct interpretation. According to Sanford, [t]he opinion delivered by this court at the time of rendering its decree may be consulted to ascertain what was intended by its mandate.... 160 U.S. at 256, 16 S.Ct. at 293. Here, the opinion delivered by this court at the time of rendering its mandate analyzes and reaches only the propriety of the JMOL of non-infringement. Given that willfulness and claim identicality were deemed moot (unless the JMOL of non-infringement were reversed), our mandate to reinstate the jury verdict could only have referred to the reinstatement of the verdict of infringement, the only issue appealed. It is incorrect to conclude that we decided issues not only undecided on the merits by the trial court because they were moot, and thus on appeal unripe, but also neither presented to us nor discussed in our opinion, nor necessary to our disposition of the appeal. The scope of our review, and our power to review, was limited to the sole order that was appealed. That order was limited to infringement.
21 Cases with analogous fact situations are instructive in determining the scope of the mandate. In Conway, a case cited and relied upon by the district court, the plaintiff moved for a new trial on two separate grounds. 644 F.2d at 1060. The district court granted the motion based on the first ground only. The court of appeals reversed, discussing only the first ground. After receipt of the mandate from the first appeal, judgment was entered for the defendant based on the jury verdict. The plaintiffs then moved again for a new trial, re-urging the ground previously ignored by the district court. The district court granted this motion and the court of appeals affirmed. On this second appeal, the court noted that, on the first appeal, the appellate court discussed and passed upon only the first ground urged by the plaintiffs' motion for a new trial. Nor did the briefs of the parties at that appeal rely upon or discuss the second ground.... Id. at 1061. The court held that the law of the case doctrine applies only to those issues decided expressly or by necessary implication. Id. at 1062. The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit also stated: 22 The law of the case doctrine did not operate to prevent the district court from considering [the second ground], a meritorious issue never previously passed upon by it and never submitted to or decided by the appellate court on the previous appeal. The new trial so granted was within the power of the district court to grant. 23 Id. 24 This case is highly analogous to Conway. Here, the trial court granted only one of three JMOL motions filed by NEC, ruling on only one of three grounds urged by NEC. We reversed in an appeal from only that ruling in Laitram II. When NEC argued in the status conference call of September 8, 1995 that the motions for JMOL on the willfulness and claim identicality must be heard and decided because the reversal of the JMOL on the infringement issue rendered them no longer moot, it was within the power of the district court to reach those issues, just as it was within the power of the district court to reach the alternative ground for a new trial in Conway. The motions for JMOL on willfulness and claim identicality, like the alternative ground for a new trial in Conway, are meritorious issue[s] never previously passed upon by [the district court] and never submitted to or decided by the appellate court on the previous appeal. Conway, 644 F.2d at 1062. Thus, although cited by the district court in support of its refusal to rule on the two motions for JMOL that remained undecided, Conway, properly interpreted, actually shows that NEC was entitled to its requested rulings which in no way were precluded by the mandate. We therefore hold that, after our mandate to reinstate the jury verdict, it was within the power of the district court (and outside the scope of the mandate) to rule on the two remaining motions for JMOL--on the willfulness and claim identicality issues; and because the issues were no longer moot and could have affected aspects of the final judgment in the suit, the district court was obligated to rule on them. 25 On appeal, Laitram, in seeking to justify the district court's refusal to rule on the undecided motions, relies on Lindsey v. American Cast Iron Pipe Co., 810 F.2d 1094 (11th Cir.1987), for the proposition that a mandate to reinstate a jury verdict necessarily means to reinstate the entire verdict. In Lindsey, there were jury verdicts finding an Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) violation and willfulness. The trial judge granted defendant the equivalent of what is now called a renewed motion for JMOL, a Judgment Notwithstanding the Verdict (JNOV). The Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit reversed the grant, analyzing only the violation question. The mandate was to reverse and remand for appropriate entry of judgment on the basis of the jury verdict. Lindsey v. American Cast Iron Pipe Co., 772 F.2d 799, 802 (11th Cir.1985). On remand, neither the plaintiff nor the defendant presented additional evidence on the willfulness issue. The district court, however, made its own finding on willfulness, finding non-willfulness in conflict with the jury's explicit finding of willfulness. Lindsey, 810 F.2d at 1097. During the second appeal to the Eleventh Circuit, the court stated: [t]he court was not at liberty to make findings that conflicted with the jury's findings. Id. The court noted that [t]his court reinstated the jury verdict, and the jury's fact findings became part of our mandate.... Under the law of the case doctrine, a district court may not deviate from the appellate court's mandate. Id. (citations omitted). 26 Lindsey, however, is in no way inconsistent with our ruling here. On remand, the district court in Lindsey did not, as would be the parallel to this case, consider a JNOV as to the willfulness issue, and thus decide a question of law, but rather substituted its own finding for that of the jury, thereby acting as a substitute finder of fact. The court of appeals in Lindsey correctly noted that [o]nce a jury has necessarily or actually decided [such] an issue, the district court may not reconsider it, Lindsey, 810 F.2d at 1098. But it did not reach the analog to the question presented here: whether the district court could properly have considered a motion for JNOV on the willfulness issue. Thus, the case is inapposite. Even if it were apposite, Lindsey does not stand for the broad proposition urged by Laitram. 27 Laitram also seeks to rely on Leroy v. City of Houston, 906 F.2d 1068 (5th Cir.1990), for the proposition that even issues never discussed in the opinion by the court of appeals are nevertheless all subsumed in its mandate. In Leroy, the mandate contained a specific dollar amount judgment, but on remand the district court recalculated interest and decided other damages issues. On appeal of the final judgment, the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit stated: The fact that we did not expressly address the expenses in question is irrelevant, the point being that we vacated the judgment that included them and directed entry of judgment for a specific figure, which the district court thereafter exceeded. Id. at 1077. 28 The reasoning in Leroy is entirely inapplicable here because the mandate there included a specific dollar figure for the damages to be awarded and in reversing the district court, the court of appeals relied explicitly on the fact that the district court award exceeded the specific dollar amount mandated. While it would have been within the power of the district court to re-open issues not addressed expressly or by necessary implication by the court of appeals, it was clearly not within its power to award a different amount of money than that mandated explicitly by the court of appeals. Here, since damages were not addressed in Laitram II, and since nothing the district court could have done on the open issues could conflict with explicit statements in our mandate, the rule of Leroy does not apply. 29