Posts Tagged: "ABA model rules"

Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker Connected to World Patent Marketing Fraudulent Scheme to Bilk Inventors

In May 2018, Scott Cooper and his companies, World Patent Marketing Inc. and Desa Industries Inc., agreed to a settlement with the Federal Trade Commission that bans them from the invention promotion business, and ordered payment of $25,987,192. The FTC charged World Patent Marketing with being nothing more than a scam, bilking millions of dollars from inventors. “The record supports a preliminary finding that Defendants devised a fraudulent scheme to use consumer funds to enrich themselves,” concluded United States District Judge Darrin P. Gayles as he issued a preliminary injunction in August 2017. Matthew G. Whitaker, the Acting Attorney General of the United States who ascended to the position with the resignation of Jeff Sessions, served on the advisory board of World Patent Marketing. Worse, Whitaker was involved in some of the egregious intimidation that led to the charges, issuance of an injunction and ultimately the settlement.

6 Core Values and 5 Emotional Intelligence Skills Leading to Sound Ethical Decisions

Core values are key to avoiding ethical violations. This is because most ethics violations are not intentional. They occur because decisions are being made based on the wrong values (i.e., increased revenues alone) or on emotion (i.e., fear that taking more time to evaluate will be disastrous). Establishing sound core values and strong decision making emotional intelligence skills will help ensure that you do not commit an unintended ethics violation.

OED Discipline for False, Misleading Statements in Brief to CAFC

The USPTO charged that Hicks violated 37 C.F.R. 10.20 et seq.[1] Ultimately, Hicks acknowledged that he violated 37 C.F.R. 10.23(b)(5), which prohibited “conduct that is prejudicial to the administration of justice.” *** Thus, Hicks likely stands for the proposition that a practitioner must inform OED if they know that another practitioner has made a false, misleading or improper statement to a tribunal, or as Hicks did, cites a non-precedential opinion to a tribunal.

Bernard Knight Interview Finale

In part 1 of the interview we discussed why he choose McDermott, what it was like working for David Kappos and working with Federal Circuit Judge Ray Chen when he was Solicitor at the USPTO, and the appointment of Michelle Lee to be Deputy Director of the USPTO. In part 2 of the interview, which appears below, we discuss the new ethics rules adopted by the USPTO, the future of the USPTO, patent reform legislation, abusive patent litigation, and what the AIA was attempting to achieve relative to post grant patent challenges.

USPTO Adopts New Ethics Rules Based on ABA Model Rules

The Federal Register Notice explains that currently there are approximately 41,000 registered patent practitioners, with at least 75% of the roster of patent practitioners being attorneys who are admitted in one or more States. Given that the ABA Model Rules have been adopted by 49 states and the District of Columbia, nearly all of the attorneys registered to practice at the USPTO are already professionally governed by ethics rules modeled from the ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct. Thus, this change should not be considered to be a substantive change to the rules that apply to patent attorneys.Indeed, the Federal Register Notice explains that this USPTO efforts “benefits and reduces costs for most practitioners by clarifying and streamlining their professional responsibility obligations.” Of course, for those who are patent agents, however, the rules will be different.