Federal Judiciary

Pretrial Conference in Washington, D.C.

By Michael C. Smith

As readers are aware, Federal Circuit Judge Randall Rader is sitting as a district judge in several patent cases set for trial in Marshall in April.  Yesterday I enjoyed a quick trip to Washington, D.C. to attend the pretrial conference in one of the cases, in which I am acting as local counsel.  It was held in the Federal Circuit building on the east side of Lafayette Square (the park immediately north of the White House).  We spent a full day, meeting with Judge Rader from 10 am till after 5 going through the various pending summary judgment and Daubert motions, as well as going over Judge Rader's procedures for the trial itself (number of jurors, number of strikes, time for trial - that sort of thing).

It was a one-night trip (actually there was an unintended second night at DFW last night, but that's a different story) but I still managed to fit in a visit the night before to my favorite DC bookshop from my graduate school days, Second Story Books off Dupont Circle where I picked up some prints for the new office, and a nighttime walking tour of the new World War II Memorial and a few other monuments on the way back to the hotel.  (My wife and I are headed back to DC Monday with our oldest, Grayson (10) for a Marshall Chamber of Commerce trip so I was doing a little advance work as well, as this will be Grayson's introduction to our nation's capitol).  Also went to 8 am Mass at St. Matthews's Cathedral on Rhode Island the morning of the hearing, which I really enjoyed.  I used to be an altar server at St. Matthew's back when I worked in DC, and served at the MWF 8 am Masses, so it was nice to see how they do it these days, and say hi to the Water Skiing Pope and Our Lady of the Tennis Racket sculptures.  The server cassocks are now tan (instead of black with white surplice, as God intended) and the priest was, as best I can tell, a teenager, but it was still a good way to start the day and brought back some good memories.

Full post as published by Eastern District of Texas Federal Court Practice on March 09, 2010 (boomark / email).