W.D. Pennsylvania District Court Selected to Participate in Patent Pilot Program

by: Robert Wagner, intellectual property attorney at Picadio Sneath Miller & Norton, P.C.

On June 8, 2011, Chief Judge Gary L. Lancaster announced that the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts selected the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania to be one of 14 Districts Courts to participate in a 10-year Patent Pilot Program. As part of this program, the Courts will funnel the majority of patent cases to designated patent judges in each district with the intention of providing litigants with Judges that have special training and interest in hearing these cases. As the U.S. Court press release stated:

“In the pilot program, patent cases filed in participating district courts are initially randomly assigned to all district judges, regardless of whether they have been designated to hear such cases.  A judge who is randomly assigned a patent case and is not among the designated judges may decline to accept the case. That case is then randomly assigned to one of the district judges designated to hear patent cases.”

The Administrative Office selected Courts with an established history and interest in patent litigation and those with local patent rules already in place (the Western District of Pennsylvania implemented its local patent rules back on April 1, 2005). The fourteen District Courts selected by the Director of the Administrative Office of the United States Courts were:

• Eastern District of New York
• Southern District of New York
• Western District of Pennsylvania
• District of New Jersey
• District of Maryland
• Northern District of Illinois
• Southern District of Florida
• District of Nevada
• Eastern District of Texas
• Northern District of Texas
• Western District of Tennessee
• Central District of California
• Northern District of California
• Southern District of California

The Western District of Pennsylvania’s participation in this pilot program, along with its local patent rules already in place, reinforces that Pittsburgh is an attractive venue for litigants wishing to resolve patent disputes.