Driessen v. Sony BMG Music Entertainment et al
Filing
246
MEMORANDUM DECISION and Order denying 229 Motion ; granting 232 Motion for Entry of Judgment. For the reasons discussed in the Order, the court DENIES Plaintiffs motion for reconsideration filed as a Rule 46 Objection and GRANTS Defendants request to clarify that it has denied Plaintiffs all relief in its Memorandum Decision & Order dated March 10, 2015. This case is closed. Signed by Judge Clark Waddoups on 8/19/15. (jmr)
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
DISTRICT OF UTAH, CENTRAL DIVISION
JAMES L. DRIESSEN, MARGUERITE A.
DRIESSEN,
MEMORANDUM DECISION AND
ORDER DENYING PLAINTIFFS’
MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION
AND GRANTING DEFENDANTS’
MOTION FOR ENTRY OF FINAL
JUDGMENT
Plaintiffs,
vs.
SONY MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT, et al.,
Case No. 2:09-cv-0140-CW
Defendants.
Judge Clark Waddoups
INTRODUCTION
At oral argument on May 15, 2014, the court circulated a tentative “Proposed Order on
Limited Claim Construction for Purpose of Re-Noticed Motions for Summary Judgment” and
invited the parties to address the Proposed Order in further oral argument at that hearing. The
Proposed Order was in some respects beneficial to Plaintiffs’ posture on summary judgment.
After further oral argument directly addressing the content of the Proposed Order, the court took
the matter under advisement. The court then carefully reevaluated the Plaintiffs’ patents and
arguments in their entirety and carefully reviewed the applicable legal standards and various
arguments in both parties’ many briefs and at oral argument.
On March 10, 2015, the court issued its Memorandum Decision & Order on this limited
claim construction process and on Defendants’ renoticed Motions for Summary Judgment. (Dkt.
No. 228.) The Order noted the intervening decision by the United States Supreme Court in
Nautilus, Inc. v. Biosig Instruments, Inc., 134 S. Ct. 2120 (as corrected June 10, 2014) and found
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that it was controlling for Defendants’ Motion for Summary Judgment of Invalidity Based on
Indefiniteness. The court then exhaustively analyzed Plaintiffs’ patents and legal arguments in
light of controlling legal standards and precedents in a 26 page Memorandum Decision,
providing lengthy explanation for deviating from its Proposed Order circulated as a tentative
ruling during the hearing.
Plaintiffs subsequently filed a “Rule 46 Objection”. (Dkt. No. 229.) As noted in the
court’s Order dated March 25, 2015, this filing is in substance a Motion for Reconsideration
under Rule 54(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure in which Plaintiffs argue
that the court failed “to acknowledge several important structures and materials
disclosed in the patent documents” possibly because of “bias naturally resulting
from a 6-year focus only on patent invalidity in an attempt to dispense with
bothersome litigation” (Dkt. No. 229, at 2), to explain its decision not to enter the
Proposed Order circulated at the hearing and instead construe the claims as in the
Memorandum Decision and Order (id. at 4-6), to distinguish between “retrieving”
and “receiving” in construing the means-plus-function claim limitation (id. at 67), to understand the audience of the patent and the drafter’s “intended meaning”
and thus having “considerable confusion regarding the meaning of and
relationship between paragraphs 1, 2, and 6 of section 112” (id. at 8-9), and to
consider written description for the terms at issue in Claim 10 of the ‘500 Patent
possibly due to not having a “word processor with which to perform a simple
word search” (id. at 10-13). In sum, it is argued that the court employed “absurd”
“circular logic” and committed “grievous error” in its claim construction (id. at
12-13).
(Order for Briefing on Pls.’ Rule 46 Objection 1-2 [Dkt. No. 229].) The court invited the parties
to brief the issues Plaintiffs raised in this filing. Plaintiffs then also moved to amend their “Rule
46 Objection” to style it as a Motion to Alter or Amend Judgment under Rule 59(e) of the
Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. (Dkt. No. 236.)
Defendants succinctly analyzed Plaintiffs’ motion in their Response (Dkt. No. 237),
arguing persuasively several concrete reasons why the court’s Memorandum Decision & Order
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dated March 10, 2015 was not in error and urging the court to enter final judgment. Defendants
also separately moved for entry of final judgment under Rule 58(a). (Dkt. No. 232.)
The court has carefully reviewed Plaintiffs’ “Rule 46 Objection” together with its related
briefing and its own previous Orders in this case, in particular its Memorandum Decision &
Order dated March 10, 2015 (Dkt. No. 228), to which Plaintiffs are taking exception. The court
finds no merit to the Motion for Reconsideration.
DISCUSSION
Although motions for reconsideration are not specifically provided for under the Federal
Rules of Civil Procedure, courts entertain them under Rule 54(b), if they relate to an
interlocutory order, or under Rule 60(b), if they relate to a final order. See Raytheon
Constructors v. Asarco Inc., 368 F.3d 1214, 1217 (10th Cir. 2003). It is well established that “a
motion for reconsideration is appropriate where the court has misapprehended the facts, a party’s
position, or the controlling law.” Servants of the Paraclete v. Does, 204 F.3d 1005, 1012 (10th
Cir. 2000). But the Tenth Circuit has also affirmed that “revisiting” issues in a motion for
reconsideration that have already been addressed in the initial briefing “is not the purpose of a
motion to reconsider”; more importantly, “advancing new arguments or supporting facts which
were otherwise available for presentation when the original . . . motion was briefed” is
“inappropriate.” Van Skiver v. United States, 952 F.2d 1241, 1242-44 (10th Cir. 1991) (internal
quotation marks and citations omitted).
In Van Skiver, the Tenth Circuit did not address the merits of the motion to reconsider
because the moving party had failed to demonstrate any basis for relief under Rule 60(b) of the
Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Id. “Relief under Rule 60(b) is discretionary and is warranted
only in exceptional circumstances” such as those listed in Rule 60(b). Id. (quoting Bud Brooks
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Trucking, Inc. v. Bill Hodges Trucking Co., 909 F.2d 1437, 1440 (10th Cir. 1990)). The same
standard applies to relief sought under Rule 54(b), including the following criteria by which the
relief sought is measured: “Grounds warranting a motion to reconsider include (1) an intervening
change in the controlling law, (2) new evidence previously unavailable, and (3) the need to
correct clear error or prevent manifest injustice.” Servants of the Paraclete, 204 F.3d at 1012.
“Motions to reconsider are not to be used as a second chance when a party has failed to present
its strongest case in the first instance.” Sec. Serv. Fed. Credit Union v. First Am. Mortgage
Funding, LLC, 906 F. Supp. 2d 1108, 1111 (D. Colo. 2012), overruled on unrelated grounds in
Sec. Serv. FCU v. First Am. Mortg. Funding, LLC, 771 F.3d 1242 (10th Cir. 2014).
The court has carefully considered all of Plaintiffs’ arguments throughout six years of
briefings and hearings in this lawsuit. As noted in its Order dated March 25, 2015, the court has
been “mindful of Plaintiffs’ decision to represent themselves pro se” and has frequently
communicated that it has wished “Plaintiffs to be adequately heard on their patent claims”; in
fact, “the court has allowed Plaintiffs to amend their Complaint three times and has solicitously
entertained a previous ‘Rule 46 Objection’ from Plaintiffs (see Dkt. Nos. 172, 173, 177, and
184).” Upon review of Plaintiffs’ current motion for reconsideration and further review of its
Memorandum Decision & Order dated March 10, 2015, the court agrees with Defendants that it
has not committed clear error on any point of its ruling. To the contrary, Plaintiffs’ Rule 46
Objection merely “revisits” the same issues that were exhaustively briefed and argued at oral
argument, which the Tenth Circuit has held “is not the purpose of a motion to reconsider.” Van
Skiver, 952 F.2d at 1243.
The Van Skiver Court focused on the possibility that a post-ruling change in law could
potentially justify a motion for reconsideration under the grounds listed in Rule 60(b), in
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particular under Rule 60(b)(6), which provides that “the court may relieve a party or its legal
representative from a final judgment, order, or proceeding for . . . any other reason that justifies
relief.” Van Skiver noted that this provision has been characterized by the Tenth Circuit as “a
‘grand reservoir of equitable power to do justice in a particular case.’” Id. at 1244 (quoting
Pierce v. Cook & Co., 518 F.2d 720, 722 (10th Cir. 1975) (en banc)). It has been interpreted to
allude to legal error arising from a post-judgment change in law, as in Pierce. Id.
Here, the court specifically accounted for the primary relevant change in law that had
occurred between oral argument and the issuance of the Memorandum Decision & Order—the
United States Supreme Court’s decision in Nautilus, Inc. v. Biosig Instruments, Inc., 134 S. Ct.
2120. The court thoroughly analyzed that decision and its application to the patents at issue in
Plaintiffs’ lawsuit. Having now reviewed in detail its Memorandum Decision & Order dated
March 10, 2015, the court finds that it correctly applied Nautilus and the substantial surviving
Federal Circuit precedent preceding it to Plaintiffs’ patent claims. Plaintiffs have presented no
“post-judgment change in law” that has “arise[n] in a related case”; accordingly, the motion for
reconsideration is not well taken. Van Skiver, 952 F.2d at 1245. The court therefore DENIES
Plaintiffs’ “Rule 46 Objection”.
Despite Plaintiffs’ motion for reconsideration and their continued arguments in favor of it
in their Reply brief (Dkt. No. 238), Plaintiffs nevertheless appear to join Defendants’ request to
make the judgment final because they would like it to be ripe for appeal. Plaintiffs close their
Reply brief as follows: “Plaintiffs now ask that the court to enter [sic] final judgment based on
the Order [dated March 10, 2015].” (Pls.’ Reply 8 [Dkt. No. 238].) The court agrees that it is
now appropriate to do so quoting Defendants’ summary of the outcome of the March 10, 2015
Memorandum Decision & Order:
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The Court’s decision invalidated each asserted claim of the three patents in this
case (U.S. Patent Nos. 7,003,500; 7,636,695; and 7,742,993). As the Court noted
in its decision, Claims 8 and 9 of the ‘500 patent were not put at issue by
Defendants’ motions for summary judgment. This was so because Claims 8 and 9
of the ‘500 patent were not identified as asserted claims in the TAC or at anytime
during the pendency of this case. Thus, each of Plaintiffs causes of action based
on the ‘500, ‘695, and ‘993 patents have been disposed of and Plaintiffs have no
other causes of action.
Any counterclaims by Defendants (none have been filed at this time) were
rendered moot by the Court’s March 10, 2014 decision. Accordingly, the Court’s
March 10, 2014 decision resolved all the causes of action in this case and entry of
final judgment is proper.
(Defs.’ Mot. Entry Final Judgment 2 [Dkt. No. 232].) The court agrees that its March 10, 2015
Memorandum Decision & Order disposed of all of Plaintiffs’ claims and that “Plaintiffs have no
other causes of action.” Accordingly, the Memorandum Decision & Order dated March 10, 2015
“denies all relief” to Plaintiffs as required of a final judgment under Rule 58(b)(1)(C).
Defendants have brought no counterclaims. This case is therefore closed and, upon entry of final
judgment by the Clerk of Court, will be ripe for appeal in the discretion of the parties and in
compliance with all rules governing such an appeal.
CONCLUSION
For the reasons discussed above, the court DENIES Plaintiffs’ motion for reconsideration
filed as a “Rule 46 Objection” and GRANTS Defendants request to clarify that it has denied
Plaintiffs all relief in its Memorandum Decision & Order dated March 10, 2015. This case is
closed.
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SO ORDERED this 19th day of August, 2015.
BY THE COURT:
______________________________
Clark Waddoups
United States District Court Judge
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