Silicon Beach

by Davis MacDonald

  She made no bones about what she wanted now, giving him a lusty look that raised the heat in his loins. In seconds they were joined again on the bed, rolling, laughing, coupling and gasping.

  Afterward she made him buy her coffee at Killer Shrimp. He knew she wanted him just to stay on the boat with her for the day. Not go to his office. She was worried about his wound, about his general condition, about his safety. She embarked on a stalling strategy, initiating a discussion of his patent case, knowing full well he’d be unable to refrain from expounding.

  She was clever. And all female.

  CHAPTER 6

  8:30 AM Friday

  “Okay, Judge. Tell me about your case. But keep it simple. I’m a simple lady.”

  “Well, Katy, let’s suppose you developed something,” said the Judge. “Say a… a new hamburger flipper. Maybe it helps cook the meat more evenly, or drains the fat away, or has some other special feature.”

  “Oh, I like this Judge. I can flip you off with my new flipper!”

  “Katy…”

  “Sorry, honey. Even though I’m… we’re newly pregnant, I still can’t get enough of you. After you explain about your flipper, you’re going to have to demonstrate.” Katy giggled.

  “Well anyway Katy, this new hamburger flipper is your original idea. Its novel and never been used before. So you file with the U.S. Patent Office and get a patent.”

  “Whoopee, I have a flipping patent.”

  “Yes, well, anyway, let’s suppose some rival lady who lives with some other ex-Judge on a boat in L.A. Harbor develops a flipper which might be similar. She patents it after you but beats you to market. She starts selling her flipper.”

  “In violation of my patent? I’ll flip her off too.”

  “Or you might bring a law suit in Federal District Court for infringement. Seek damages and an order putting the rival lady out of business.”

  “So that’s what this Carl Greene did? He had his patent and he sued this other guy?”

  “Eh, no. One would have thought he’d do that, but in this case he didn’t.”

  “Wait, Judge. You promised ‘not complicated’. Why didn’t he sue?”

  “He likely lacked the money.”

  “Oh, poor Carl. So what happened?”

  “Well suppose, like Carl, you don’t have lots of funds around to pursue a patent infringement case.”

  “On my flipper?”

  “Right. But the rival lady is making lots of money selling her flipper.”

  “I bet she is. The bitch.”

  “So the rival lady sues you.”

  “Me?’

  “Yes, you.”

  “But I’m the injured party. She can’t sue me, Judge. That’s not right.”

  “Well she can. For the cost of the filing fee in this country anyone can sue anyone for anything. The claim might get thrown out. But it’s open season on filing claims.”

  “You lawyers. You guys have everything rigged as an attorneys’ full employment act. So how can she sue me?”

  The Judge took a big breath, preparing to explain. He knew Katy wasn’t terribly interested in this stuff. It was boring. Nothing like the movies or Law & Order stuff she liked to binge on Netflix. But she knew he relished talking about it. It was what he did. The job defined the man.

  She let him ramble on because she loved him. And he appreciated that. But she also was trying to mother him. Using every trick in the book to discourage him from going to his office today. That wasn’t going to work. But she didn’t know that yet.

  “The rival lady says her flipper embodies novel technology,” the Judge continued. “That your patent isn’t valid to preclude her from selling her flipper. That her product isn’t really a flipper at all. It’s a scraper. She wants a court order saying her flipper doesn’t infringe on your patent. That she’s free to market it and sell it and license it. And you can’t ever complain because her flipper is so different in design from yours.”

  “But you said her flipper infringed on my patent, Judge.”

  “No. I said the technology ‘might’ be similar.”

  “Okay, so what happens?”

  “A judge has to make a decision: is the design different enough that the rival lady can legally market her flipper?”

  “So there’s a lawsuit? We love lawsuits Judge. It pays the rent.”

  “Yes. And now you’re dragged into litigation that you wanted no part of because you have limited funds. You have to defend. You are the defendant. You don’t want a judge to issue the order your rival lady seeks. You believe her technology is an out-and-out copy of yours.”

  “Okay Judge, so I hire my lawyer. I’d always hire you darling. Cause I wouldn’t have to pay. You could take it out in trade. Me and my flipper.”

  “Yes. Well here’s where it gets a little tricky.”

  “We like ‘Tricky’, Judge. But we only want to be ‘Tricky’ with you.”

  Katy giggled. The Judge pushed on, determined to set out some sort of coherent explanation and then make a break for his office.

  “Your lawyer suggests you make an offer to waive all infringement claims against the rival lady and she would waive all claims against you. Just to make the law suit go away. So the rival lady can continue selling her flipper without paying you anything. And you can sell your flipper without paying her. You two share the flipper market.”

  “I have to do that?”

  “Well if you don’t have the money to defend, what can you do?”

  “Damn.”

  “But here’s what’s strange.”

  “Okay, what?” Katy leaned forward, feigning intense interest, determined to hold him beside her as long as she could.

  “Your rival lady turns you down. She doesn’t want to settle her suit and go away. She wants a full legal judgment that she has the patent rights on her flipper, and her flipper doesn’t infringe on your flipper patent.”

  “But she’s got practically everything she wants with the settlement, Judge. She’s stolen my technology. Wouldn’t that be enough for her?”

  “One might think so.”

  “Why doesn’t she go along and settle, Judge?”

  “It’s a good question. I’m not sure. There might be another agenda here.”

  “So what happens?”

  “The case goes forward. You start shelling out for legal fees to defend. You have no choice. Otherwise you might lose rights to your technology. You’ll certainly lose the right to stop her from stealing your technology and ruining your market.”

  “Damn.”

  “Next, the rival lady suggests binding arbitration instead of trying the case in front of a patent judge in Federal District Court.”

  “And I agree because I want to save money, right Judge?”

  “Yes. You agree.”

  “And why does this rival lady suggest arbitration?”

  “Well it’s cheaper for her too. And she gets it before an arbitrator who maybe isn’t a patent lawyer.”

  “Like you, Judge. The crotchety old judge with the all seeing eye.”

  “I’m not crotchety, and I’m not old.”

  “Crotchety only sometimes, Judge. And old is a relative term.” Katy gave the Judge her big smile with all the teeth, taking the sting out of her words.

  “Maybe the rival lady thinks it will be easier to convince a non-patent lawyer acting as the arbitrator that her flipper doesn’t infringe your patent. And maybe, just maybe, the rival lady thinks she may be able to get away with broad discovery.”

  “Just like you, Judge.”

  “Me?”

  “Yeah. You have broad discovery of me. I’m the broad. And you had your discovery. And a broad discovery it was. Course you took your rights a little far I must say. You’ve left me in a delicate way.” Katy batted her eyelashes.

  “I haven’t left, Katy. I never will. Until I kick off. You’re stuck with me.”

  She reached over to hold his hand.

  “Okay, Judge,
so far so good. Then what happens?”

  “The rival lady originally sought an order declaring that her flipper doesn’t violate your patent.”

  “Okay.”

  “But now she’s heard you might have developed an even better way to flip.”

  “Nobody flips like I do, Judge. I’m a natural born flipper, at least with you.”

  “But the rival lady’s afraid you’ll claim someday that your new way to flip is entitled to its own new patent that takes priority over your original patent. And you’ll claim the flipper the rival lady is selling now infringes on your ‘new’ patented way to flip.”

  “And I have a patent on this new way to flip, Judge?”

  “No. Not yet. You haven’t disclosed it to anyone. You haven’t filed for a patent yet. It’s your proprietary confidential information.”

  “I’m hot shit aren’t I, Judge. Well I really am anyway, but go on. So the rival lady can’t be sure what I’ve got, Judge. It’s confidential.”

  “That’s right. But she wants you to tell her.”

  “She can suck air, Judge. I’m not telling her a thing. How’d she hear about it anyway?”

  “I don’t know. Another good question.”

  “So what’s next, Judge?”

  “She asks the Judge for an order to force you to disclose your new technology in the arbitration.”

  “She can’t do that.”

  “She argues she’s entitled to an order that your new method of flipping, to the extent it takes priority over your existing patent, doesn’t preclude her from selling her flipper. She makes a motion to the arbitrator for a discovery order. An order requiring you to disclose to her your new technology for flipping.”

  “That doesn’t sound right Judge.”

  “Well, it depends on how close your new flipping ideas are related to your existing patent, and to our rival lady’s flipper technology. Have you created something brand new, or is your new flipping idea perhaps a follow-on, or even a supplemental part of your original patent? She may have a point.”

  “The only point she has is the money to hire fancy lawyers, Judge. How can the rival lady open up a claim against my new and secret flipper design?”

  “Courts favor handling all the legal issues in a case at once, Katy. So the case doesn’t have to come back to the court again. The court, or the arbitrator, will at least listen to this sort of argument and consider whether it’s a valid request for discovery.”

  “So the arbitrator’s going to make me disclose my new secret flipper technology to the rival lady. Everyone can argue about it and then the arbitrator can decide?”

  “Not quite. The arbitrator is not convinced that discovery in the lawsuit should include your new flipper technology. He’s not sure whether it’s closely related to your existing patent, or something brand new.”

  “So?”

  “So he orders the information on your new flipper technology to be produced in Chambers.”

  “For your eyes only, Judge? Just like me.”

  “Right. You give the information just to me first. I’ll have a look and see if it’s so entwined with your original patent that I should deal with both claims at once.”

  “Okay, so you as arbitrator have a first look-see. And if you decide my patented flipper and my new confidential flipper technology are closely entwined, what do you do, Judge?”

  “I’ll order the rival lady to sign a confidentiality agreement.”

  “Good luck on that, Judge. The bitch will be stealing my ideas and manufacturing my stuff in China in a heartbeat, regardless of what she signs!”

  “Eh, well, anyway, then your new flipper design will be disclosed to the rival lady. Both sides will make their arguments about whether the rival lady’s flipper infringes your existing patent. Then the arbitrator will decide. If there is no infringement, then the arbitrator decides if the rival lady’s flipper will infringe on your new confidential technology that, once patented, will take priority over your earlier patent.”

  “What happens if I win, Judge?”

  “Then the arbitrator will find the rival lady’s flipper violates your patent. The rival lady will have to either stop her production of flippers or make a deal with you to pay a royalty.”

  “And if I lose?”

  “Then the arbitrator will find that the rival lady can sell her flipper. He might also find your new confidential flipper technology can’t be used because it violates her filed patent.”

  “So she’s free to go on with her business?”

  “Yes.”

  “And she might stop me cold from commercializing my new flipper technology?”

  “Yes.”

  “She must be doing a lot of flipping to spend all that money on lawyers. She’s probably got a gang of pretty flippers on every street corner, stirring up traffic.”

  “It would seem.”

  “You said my rival lady might have another agenda, Judge?”

  “Well, the way my case has played out so far, it almost seems like Hicks, the plaintiff in my case, is more interested in the disclosure of Carl Greene’s new confidential technology than he is in winning his case.”

  “But your case isn’t about flipping hamburgers, is it Judge? This is Silicon Beach. It must be about some fancy software or gizmo.”

  “You would think. But actually it’s more about basic chemistry. And an old substance we all take for granted.”

  “What’s that, Judge?”

  “Oil..!”

  CHAPTER 7

  9:45 AM Friday

  The Judge left Katy there, staring after him over another sip of coffee. When her delaying tactics stopped working she’d tried to bully him into staying. But he’d have none of it. He was too old to be mothered. Well… for very long, anyway. He wanted to get to his office. He wondered who would show up. The plaintiff, Carl Greene, was dead. But would his attorney come? Would he know the circumstances? Would the defendant, Randall Hicks, come? And his attorney? What did they know about last night's events?

  He had Katy's spare key to his car so he could retrieve his wheels, and had borrowed folding cash and one of her credit cards. He looked back at her from the Killer Shrimp Café parking lot, perched on her deck chair, nose buried in the morning’s newspaper. Her annoyance at his departure had evidently been short-lived. She was laughing uproariously at something in the paper, her gold ponytail bobbing with mirth.

  He called Uber from the pay phone on the dock and told them he needed a ride. He’d never actually used Uber before, but what the hell, he figured he be modern and give it a try. They laughed at him on the phone.

  “Look Sir.” There was that damn ‘Sir’ again. Jesus he hated he was old. Could they tell even over the phone?

  “You can only get an Uber from your cell. You have to go online on your cell, and then find the App, and then download it to your cell, and then figure out how to work it to talk to one of our drivers. Why don’t you ask your son?”

  “Patronizing son of a bitch,” muttered the Judge. He called a yellow cab.

  He directed the taxi driver, who was willing to chat with him, and smelled good, and since he was from Bangladesh had interesting things to say, to take him to Santa Monica where his arbitration office was located. His car was still parked in the garage beneath the office.

  The Judge got out of the taxi feeling woozy. His arm was throbbing. The pain pill had worn off. But it was nothing to the shock he got as he glanced inside the newsstand box outside his office.

  The front page of the Los Angeles Times bore a nasty headline, blaring at him through the plastic box: LOCAL EX-JUDGE LOSES PANTS IN NOCTURNAL SWIM.

  "Son of a bitch," the Judge muttered under his breath, feeling his face go crimson.

  And there was his picture, hair matted, wrapped in the blanket, looking half-crazed. He’d been in shock, and it showed. The photo was credited to Lou Garo. Someone would pay for this. He would ferret out the people behind the attack, and he was damn well going to
see their collective ass was fried.

  The Judge had the corner office of a floor operated as an executive suite in a building at the intersection of Main Street and Marine Avenue, two blocks from the Santa Monica Beach.

  It was 9:50. The Judge was a little early. In the reception area, an open bay with well-worn purple sofas, faded black carpet and somewhat battered end tables stacked with stale magazines, sat Bruce Williams, the lawyer for defendant Carl Greene, playing with his cell. Across the small space Dick Harper, the lawyer for plaintiff Randall Hicks and his company, sat on the edge of his seat, watching for the Judge to step out of the elevator. Both lawyers leaped to their feet. It might not be as majestic as his old court room, thought the Judge, but he still had a measure of power.

  Dick Harper reached the Judge first, sputtering with ill-concealed glee, "Carl Greene is deceased, Your Honor. There is no defendant. We are entitled to our judgment and an order for discovery of Greene’s new technology so we can establish that it does not impact our technology."

  "Not so fast, Dick." Bruce Williams waded in behind. "I now represent the Estate of Carl Greene. His estate wishes to proceed with our defense."

  The Judge held up his hands. “Gentlemen, gentlemen. Let's move to my office and hash this out there."

  They both clamped their mouths shut in mid-sentence, conditioned to strict compliance with the order of a judge, and fell in line behind him.

  He marched them down a long hallway, narrower than current building codes would allow, covered with a fresh coat of soft yellow to make the space seem larger and less dated.

  His corner office was a medium sized room, perhaps fifteen by twenty, containing a long narrow conference table surrounded by leather chairs of uncertain vintage. In the corner, shoved against the windows on one side, sat a roll-top desk with its cover down and locked. A clock and old photos of Santa Monica in chipped Mexican frames hung on the walls, and to the left of the door sat a small bureau with locked drawers. A coffee pot, kettle, cups, bottled water and canned soda were neatly stacked on top.