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Have You Told Your Court Reporter Lately That You Love Her?

By Michael C. Smith

Mirror Worlds, LLC v. Apple, Inc., 6:08cv88 (E.D. Tex. Nov. 3, 2010)

Judge: Leonard Davis

Holding:  Now look, y'all...

Shortly after its recent loss before a Tyler jury in Judge Davis' court, Apple's counsel filed a notice of intent to request redaction of the trial transcript.  This afternoon Judge Davis, perhaps seeing the writing on the wall (these are patent lawyers we're talking about after all),  provided some useful guidance to when redaction is and is now appropriate:

The Eastern District has procedures to redact personally identifying information from transcripts. See The Ohio Willow Wood Company v. Thermo-Ply, Inc., 9:07-CV-274, Docket No. 27 (Clark, J.); Transcript Procedures for Attorneys (2008); Local Rule CV-5.2. The policy protects four categories of personal data identifiers, namely social security and taxpayer-identification numbers, dates of birth, initials of minor children, and financial account numbers. ?If an attorney wishes to redact additional information, he or she may make a motion to the court.? Local Rule CV-5.2(b)(4).

The Court warns the parties that it rarely redacts statements made in open court and thus already in the public domain unless they contain social security or taxpayer-identification numbers, dates of birth, initials of minor children, or financial account numbers or are impertinent, scandalous, or inadvertent disclosures of trade secrets. Without a specific showing of likely harm, the Court will not order redaction simply because a party deems the statements sensitive or confidential.

(Emphasis mine).  The Court went on to make a few observations about court reporters:

The District?s court reporters are busy individuals, providing their services for a myriad of courtroom proceedings including trials, claim construction hearings, motion hearings, status and case management conferences, and criminal proceedings. In a patent case, it is not unusual for transcripts to be requested?on an expedited basis?of nearly every hearing in the case. Further, the technology involved in a patent case typically increases the complexity of transcribing the proceedings. Allowing redactions any time would put an enormous burden on the District?s court reporters.

The parties should consider this guidance in deciding whether to seek any redactions.

Maybe it's court reporter week...

Image credit Allison Lewis.

Full post as published by Eastern District of Texas Federal Court Practice on November 03, 2010 (boomark / email).