Jail sentence for contempt of court: Patent lawyer gets jail time for banned question

[chicago]

Judge also granted a motion for a mistrial by O2 Micro's lawyers at Howrey -- and he hit BiTEK and its lawyers with sanctions


An inappropriate question by a Mountain View, Calif., patent lawyer during jury selection has earned him a potential 48-hour jail sentence for contempt of court. John van Loben Sels, a partner at Wang, Hartmann, Gibbs & Cauley, tried to prejudice the jury, the judge ruled, in a patent case between client Beyond Innovation Technology Co. (BiTEK) and O2 Micro.

Van Loben Sels asked potential jurors on July 6 if they had "a problem with a company that puts its headquarters offshore on a Caribbean island in order to avoid paying U.S. taxes." Eastern District of Texas Judge Charles Everingham IV, who held van Loben Sels in contempt that day, had prohibited BiTEK's lawyers from saying anything about O2 Micro's tax haven home in the Cayman Islands, as it had nothing to do with the patent case.

"BiTEK, through its counsel, has undermined the parties' expectations to a trial by a jury selected from the panel summoned according to the regular process of the court," Everingham wrote in an order Friday (.pdf), which referred to the contempt sentence and issued sanctions. "By design, the question was intended to prejudice the jury against the plaintiff, which had been introduced as having its headquarters in the Cayman Islands."

Van Loben Sels hasn't served his time yet because Judge Everingham said that if he behaves the rest of the way, the sentence could be dropped.


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Patent Lawyer Gets Jail Time for Banned Question