It's not just you. Multiple firms in town have been experiencing issues with the Court's PACER system since yesterday. Most parts of the website work fine, and you can still make filings. But one of the most critical part of the site, pulling a list of docket items in a case, appears to be down. Others report that it's still working.
This feature is something I use multiple times per day. When I'm making a request of the Court, I like to check the docket to make sure I have the most up-to-date info about what's going on in the case. I also like to use exactly the same documents thatthe Court sees. Plus, it's helpful …
Typically, final judgment is the end of the road for a patent case. It's right there in the name. Sometimes, however, it is just a further maneuver in a forever war which the parties have little hope of resolving in their lifetimes.
There are, of course, only limited legal avenues for keeping the fires burning after final judgment. Today's case (oddly, the same as yesterday's case) deals with contempt.
The prompt was "the very embodiment of contempt." I think the bot has some personal issues to resolve.AI-Generated, displayed with permission
As we discussed yesterday, BioDelivery Sciences International, Inc. v. Alvogen Pb Research & Development LLC, C.A. No. 18-1395-CFC-CJB (D. Del.) had proceeded to judgment years ago, with the plaintiff generally prevailing.
Like most ANDA cases, the judgment contained a clause enjoining the defendant from making/selling/using the "ANDA Products" until after the expiration of the infringed patents. D.I. 308.
Years later, the defendant filed a new ANDA based on the same listed drug, apparently reformulated to design around the relevant patents. The Plaintiff, in addition to filing a new ANDA case against this ANDA, brought a motion to enforce the judgment.
Judge Connolly denied the motion, finding that it was procedureally improper:
I need not decide whether the products covered by ANDA No. 220582 are an "ANDA Product" covered by paragraph 7's injunction because I agree that the motion is procedurally improper, and I will deny it for that reason . . .
I agree that to the extent BDSI seeks to enforce the injunction in paragraph 7, it must do so by way of a contempt motion. An injunction is "an equitable decree compelling obedience under the threat of contempt[.]" And thus "injunctions are enforced through the district court's civil contempt power." Accordingly, "[i]f a party contends that another party is violating an injunction, the aggrieved party should move the court for an order to show cause why the other party should not be held in civil contempt."
D.I. 423 at 9-10 (internal citations omitted).
It's not clear from the opinion whether the door is technically open for a further motion for contempt. However, given that the Court took the parties to task for the "waste of judicial resources" and "obstreperous behavior by both sides to a degree I have rarely experienced as a judge" I would not be at all surprised if the plaintiff just let it lie and continued with the new case. Only time shall tell.
Just a heads up for D. Del. practitioners: The Court announced today that it will be closed on Friday of this week, 12/26/2025, in addition to being closed on Wednesday and Thursday as previously scheduled. This is due to an executive order issued last week. Be sure to consider whether this impacts any of your deadlines!
I couldn't find a recognizable image of a time machine that wouldn't potentially subject us to copyright issues, so you get this lovely clock instead.Matt Seymour, Unsplash
The Wayback Machine can be incredibly helpful in all kinds of cases. It allows you to pull previous copies of a website, seeing how it looked months or years ago. You can pull old local rules from circa 2007 and see the actual PDF; you can find out if that prior art product was on sale back in 2010; you can you can see exactly when the opposing party started (or stopped) marking their products.
But can the Court take judicial notice of a Wayback machine page? Judge Fallon addressed that …
The District of Delaware local rules prohibit additional briefing on motions beyond the opening, answering, and reply briefs permitted by the rules, and the "citation of subsequent authorities":
Except for the citation of subsequent authorities, no additional papers [beyond the response to a motion and a reply brief] shall be filed absent Court approval.
It's not uncommon for parties to find themselves in a position where, while discussing settlement, they end up filing a series of short (or not so short) extensions over a potentially lengthy period in order to give themselves time to negotiate.
Why not just stipulate to a full-on stay? The problem with a complete stay is that it removes all pressure to actually get the settlement done. I've seen cases where one side wanted to push the settlement forward, but would have had to essentially move to lift a stay to apply any kind of pressure. That's not where you want to be.
Sometimes, implementing the process as a series of stipulated extensions of a deadline, such as an answer deadline, can help maintain some pressure for each side to continue to negotiate while not actually requiring the parties to litigate. There is always the implicit threat that, if the parties can't agree on a further extension, the case will start right back up again.
As we've noted before, though, eventually the Court may want an update. The exact number of repeated extensions that a particular judge will tolerate likely depends on the circumstances, but it's not infinite.
We got another data point on this last week after the parties in a patent action before Judge Bryson filed 7 stipulations to stay an answer deadline. The Court granted the newest stip, but asked in the accompanying oral order for a status update within 4 days:
ORDER: This stipulation to extend time (D.I. 249 ) is granted. However, this is the seventh stipulation to extend time for defendants to file their answers and counterclaims with nearly identical language. Accordingly, parties are directed to file a joint status report with the court no later than December 12, 2025, at 5 p.m. Eastern Time setting forth what progress has been made toward settlement of this matter, what remains to be done, and when the parties expect this matter to be resolved. Signed by Judge William C. Bryson on 12/08/2025. (mpb) (Entered: 12/08/2025)
Colt International Clothing, Inc. v. Quasar Science LLC, C.A. No. 22-213-WCB, D.I. 250 (D. Del.).
On the fourth day, the parties filed a notice of settlement and promised to dismiss the case.
Missing a notice of appeal deadline is a nightmare scenario for an attorney. It's easy to imagine how it could happen: Final judgments can come at somewhat random times, and it's not a deadline that PACER flags for counsel. And, depending on how things go, it may be difficult or impossible to get the deadline extended. If that happens, that's it: your case may be over.
It looks like this nightmare almost played out in a recent District of Delaware case.
In Belden Canada ULC v. CommScope, Inc., C.A. No. 22-782-RGA (D. Del.), the Court entered a final judgment on October 14, 2025. The notice of appeal was due Thursday, November 13, 2025 …
I spent about an hour today looking for a new opinion to write about, all the while muttering to myself about how December's always a slow month for opinions, what with the many holidays and family get-togethers, to say nothing of the endless procession of time-themed ghosts with their wailing cries and clanking chains.
Humbug.
AI-Generated, displayed with permission
My search was ultimately fruitless, but it did inspire me to check if December actually is a slow month for opinions, or if that's just something that seems like it ought to be true.
So I ran the numbers through Docket Navigator, counting all the opinions on contested motions from the start of last December (2024). The data is horrid—frequently the same opinion will appear multiple times leading to unpredictable overcounting—but the errors should all be in the same direction so it should be good enough for the purposes of sating my curiosity.
As it turns out, my intuition was pretty spot on.
The three months with the fewest opinions are all big vacation or holiday months:
December - 69
June - 67
November - 65
The months with the most opinions were a bit more surprising (although they were all clustered fairly close in the top half)
August - 113
July - 114
February - 116
So there you go—if you happen to be a legal blogger looking to take a month off to avoid the torments of Christmases past, present, and future, December is a good choice. But you had best be back by the February rush.
The case involved "skylight caps"—insulated covers for skylights. Apparently Wal-Mart needs around a million of them.Walmart, CC BY 2.0
Yesterday, Chief Judge Connolly issued an opinion granting a preliminary injunction in Lennox AES Holdings LLC v. Benton, C.A. No. 25-575-CFC (D. Del.).
This contract case was originally filed in the Court of Chancery to enforce non-competition and non-solicitation provisions of an agreement related to the purchase of a business (or, at least, its assets).
The plaintiff is the business who purchased the assets. It filed suit in the Court of Chancery to stop the previous owner from selling certain kinds of products, which it alleged violated the agreement.
When a magistrate judge makes a ruling on a non-dispositive issue in a case, and a party objects, the ruling controls and remains effective until the objection is resolved:
8. Effect of Magistrate Judge Orders and Recommendations. Until a District Judge has completed his or her review of an objection to a Magistrate Judge's order or ruling on a nondispositive matter, such order or ruling shall govern further proceedings.
That means that, when you object to a notice of deposition of two of your own inventors on the basis of "burden" (and other grounds), and your burden objection unsurprisingly fails, the depositions have to go forward—even if you then file written objections to the magistrate judge's ruling.
That is, of course, unless the Court grants a motion to stay. That's what a patentee tried last week in Pierre Fabre Medicament SAS v. Rubicon Research Private Limited, C.A. No. 24-811-JLH-SRF (D. Del.).
After the Court ordered the patentee to make its inventors available for deposition by December 5, the patentee filed objections under FRCP 72, and simultaneously filed a motion to stay the order pending resolution of the objections.
However, all motions in the case were referred to Magistrate Judge Fallon, the judge to whom they were objecting. And the standard for a stay under these circumstances requires satisfying several factors, one of which is a likelihood of success on the merits. The "merits" of the objections, here, require showing that the Judge's holding is "clearly erroneous or contrary to law."
This blog is for general informational purposes. It is not an offer to perform legal services, and should not be considered a substitute for legal advice. Nothing in this blog should be construed as forming an attorney-client relationship. If you have legal questions, please consult counsel in your jurisdiction.
