SCO: jurors too busy Facebooking to rule on Unix claim
Fresh trial, or overrule - hey, we're easy, says SCO
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SCO Group wants a judge to overrule a jury that found it doesn’t own Unix. Or it wants a fresh trial. Either, really, as long as SCO gets the result it wants.
The company’s filed papers with a US court saying the jury hearing its case over whether SCO owned the Unix copyright, and that found for Novell last month, was either too stupid, too confused or too distracted to grasp the compelling power of its evidence.
According to the document here (warning PDF): "We do not know whether the verdict resulted from misapprehension of the jury instructions, confusion about the meaning of prior judicial decisions that Novell read into the record for the ostensible purpose of challenging SCO's damages theory, Novell's persistent efforts to focus the jury on the old language of the Asset Purchase Agreement ("APA") which was replaced by a binding amendment, or other factors." Yes, they were probably Facebooking on their iPhones, or something. We hear that happens a lot now.
SCO claimed its evidence demonstrates it owns the Unix and UnixWare copyrights and that the APA proves the copyrights were transferred from Novell.
Sadly, it was SCO that had pleaded with US justices for a jury to hear its case after a summary judgment by Judge Kimball and a bench trial - also held by Kimball - both went against SCO and found the company does not own the copyright on Unix.
Now, SCO wants to revert back to having a judge rule on the case, or conduct a fresh trial - whatever, SCO's really not bothered. It's just that those dumbasses on the jury "simply got it wrong" and the verdict "cannot be reconciled with the "overwhelming evidence" it presented. Apparently.
Who owns Unix is at the heart of SCO's argument that has dragged through the courts since the early 2000s that its copyrights have been violated by Linux.®
Bootnote
Thanks to Groklaw for flagging this up.
COMMENTS
Isn't it about time ...
... for the next Judge in this matter to take SCO's lawyers aside and explain what kind of effect him/her smacking them with a Rule 11 "frivolous litigation" contempt charge would have on their career?
Hey SCO
You lost. Twice. Now shut the fuck up and sit down while we grown-ups work.
And so it goes on
While SCO bleeds into the sand trying to claim the unclaimable (let's not forget who paid $20 million for a "licence"), we have Microsoft back, champing at the bit over unspecified patent claims that might or might not be in Linux.
(We can't possibly know because they won't tell anyone)
Lawyers , intellectual property, US legal system - all good for innovation, growth and prosperity, then
But the good news must surely be be that for copyright, at least, Linux must be cleaner than an operating theatre.
Now all we need is a half-decent ruling on Bilski...
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