Opinion ID: 209671
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The ′401 Patent and the Present Litigation

Text: On September 25, 2000, on behalf of Williams, Rivard filed Application Serial No. 09/668,144 (the ′144 application), a continuation of the ′018 application. Rivard also filed a Petition to Make Special for the ′144 application with an accompanying IDS listing many of the same references as his earlier IDS for the petition regarding the ′018 application. This IDS also did not include the Burton letter. Star filed the present suit on May 23, 2001, alleging that RJR infringed claims 4, 12 and 20 of the ′649 patent. As the litigation proceeded, Rivard periodically filed supplemental IDSs to the ′144 application to disclose to the PTO some of the additional prior art raised by RJR against the ′649 patent during discovery. For example, on June 12, 2001, Rivard disclosed RJR's Application Serial No. 09/735,177, which was published on April 26, 2001. Rivard also disclosed RJR's interrogatory responses regarding invalidity along with the cited references. These disclosures continued after the ′144 application was allowed in January 2002. In April 2002, the issue fee for the ′144 application was paid. In June 2002, while waiting for the ′144 application to issue as a patent, Rivard became aware of the Burton letter and Curran data when Star's trial counsel, Crowell & Moring (Crowell), informed him that RJR had raised those documents in the litigation. Rivard's initial reaction was that they should be disclosed out of an abundance of caution. Several Crowell attorneys exchanged e-mails amongst themselves discussing whether they thought the Burton letter and/or Curran data was required to be disclosed to the PTO given that the ′144 application had yet to be issued; several agreed that it may be best to err on the side of disclosure. J.A. at A10998-99. Meanwhile, Rivard and Hoscheit at the Banner firm conferred and ultimately decided that the Burton letter and the Curran data were not material and thus did not need to be disclosed to the PTO. They were never disclosed to the PTO. The ′144 application thus issued as expected on July 30, 2002, as the ′401 patent. Star immediately moved to amend its complaint to add allegations that RJR was infringing claim 41 of the ′401 patent as well.