Fixing Obvious Drafting Errors During Litigation — The CBT Flint Partners, LLC v. Return Path, Inc. Decision

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

In the CBT Flint Partners, LLC v. Return Path, Inc. decision last week (No. 2010-1202, -1203), the Federal Circuit considered when a court can rewrite a claim during litigation to fix mistakes in drafting. The Court concluded that a district court has the authority to rewrite claims to correct obvious errors even if there are multiple ways to “fix” the claim, as long as all the possible solutions leave the claim with the same scope and meaning.

The Claim at Issue

The patent at issue in CBT Flint involved an e-mail spam filtering system. One of the claim limitations required a computer to detect and analyze an e-mail. The patent drafters forgot the word “and” between these words, which led to problems. The claim at issue (with the problematic term highlighted) read:

13. An apparatus for determining whether a sending party sending an electronic mail communication directed to an intended receiving party is an authorized sending party, the apparatus comprising:

a computer in communication with a network, the computer being programmed to detect analyze the electronic mail communication sent by the sending party to determine whether or not the sending party is an authorized sending party or an unauthorized sending party, and wherein authorized sending parties are parties for whom an agreement to pay an advertising fee in return for allowing an electronic mail communication sent by the sending party to be forwarded over the network to an electronic mail address associated with the in-tended receiving party has been made.

The district court determined that there were three possible ways to fix this problem—(1) remove the word “detect”; (2) remove the word “analyze”; or (3) add the word “and” between the words “detect” and “analyze.” Because it felt that it was debatable which solution should be used, it concluded it lacked the authority to rewrite the claim. Thus, it found the claim indefinite under 35 U.S.C. § 112, ¶ 2 and granted summary judgment in favor of the defendant. The Federal Circuit reversed.

Case Law History for Rewriting Claims

The Federal Circuit noted that courts have long had the power to fix obvious drafting mistakes, citing to the Supreme Court’s decision in I.T.S. Rubber Co. v. Essex Rubber Co., 272 U.S. 429, 442 (1926). The Court further noted that it held in Novo Industries L.P. v. Micro Molds Corp., 350 F.3d 1348, 1357 (Fed. Cir. 2003) that“[a] district court can correct a patent only if (1) the correction is not subject to reasonable debate based on consideration of the claim language and the specification and (2) the prosecution history does not suggest a different interpretation of the claims.”

The Court determined that the district court erred because the three alternative solutions it was considering were not meaningfully different when viewed from the perspective of one skilled in the art. The concepts of “detecting” and “analyzing” were implicit in the rest of the claim, even if one of these terms was explicitly deleted. Thus, the scope and meaning of the claim were the same regardless of which solution the district court could have adopted. In these situations, the district court does have the authority to fix this kind of obvious mistake.

Practice Pointers and Takeaways From This Case

While this case suggests that courts are willing to bail out patentees and fix mistakes in claims during litigation, patentees should not rely on courts fixing their problems for them. In this particular case, the Federal Circuit found that the three possible solutions were all functionally identical. That will not always be the case, and, it is far more likely it will not be the case.

Obviously, the best practice is not to make mistakes in the first place, but that is often easier said than done. Patentees should be especially vigilant about reviewing the claims during prosecution to make sure that there are no mistakes. In addition, patentees should make sure to review the final, published version from the Patent Office, as mistakes sometimes do happen in the printing process. If a mistake happens after issuance, there are mechanisms to correct a patent (e.g., a certificate of correction). Finally, if a patentee is going to sue on a patent, it is especially important to review the patent again to make sure there are no mistakes. Don’t count on the court to bail you out!

The other takeaway from this case from the defense viewpoint is that courts may be more reluctant to find claims indefinite for obvious mistakes or typographic errors. Significant errors are still likely to doom patent claims, but it is not prudent to count on minor errors sinking them, too.

The bottom line with minor mistakes is that neither side should be confident in how a court will react. It may fix them, but it may not. And how a court will act likely depends on some very specific facts.