Qualcomm Ruling: Recorder Stories

The Recorder provides this report by Zushe Elinson on yesterday's Qualcomm/Broadcom ruling. (See post below for the ruling download.)

Here's the intro:

Lawyers sanctioned for their roles in the Qualcomm discovery debacle have maintained that they would be exonerated if allowed to break attorney-client privilege and tell their side of the story.

Now they'll get their chance.

In a Wednesday order lifting the sanctions, U.S. District Judge Rudi Brewster wrote that six lawyers from Day Casebeer Madrid & Batchelder and Heller Ehrman should be allowed to defend their conduct in the failure to turn over key e-mails in a patent fight between Qualcomm Inc. and Broadcom Corp. Brewster reasoned that the self-defense exception to attorney-client privilege should apply because Qualcomm tried to clear itself while criticizing the attorneys in court declarations.

Brewster vacated and remanded sanctions ordered by U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Major on Jan. 7 against Day Casebeer's James Batchelder, Adam Bier, Kevin Leung, Christian Mammen and Lee Patch, and Heller's Stanley Young. The attorneys had filed objections to Major's order, which referred them to the State Bar of California for discipline.

Update: Here's a second story by Elinson filed today.