Ina Fried

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Samsung: We Weren’t Trying to Mess With the Jury

Samsung says it was exercising its right of free speech, and not attempting to improperly influence the jury, when it emailed a press release to certain members of the media on Tuesday.

The release, which Apple has objected to, expresses disappointment with Judge Lucy Koh’s ruling excluding certain evidence that Samsung had hoped to present. Samsung had hoped to argue that it already had large touchscreen phones under development before the iPhone was announced, but Koh ruled that Samsung had not presented that argument in time for it to be heard by the jury.

“The excluded evidence would have established beyond doubt that Samsung did not copy the iPhone design,” Samsung said in its press release. “Fundamental fairness requires that the jury decide the case based on all the evidence.”

In its motion late Thursday, Samsung notes that all of the material it cited was already public and part of the court record.

“Virtually all the information and images in the excluded slides not only appeared in publicly filed documents, but also had already appeared in media reports,” Samsung said, pointing to reports by the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Huffington Post, and CNET. (AllThingsD’s coverage also comes up a few times as part of Samsung’s response.)

Apple has argued that the release was improper, and asked for a court to severely sanction Samsung, even going so far as to request the judge declare part of the case decided in Apple’s favor.

Samsung, meanwhile, denies that it had done anything wrong, while also arguing against the “draconian” penalty Apple has suggested, even should Judge Koh agree that Samsung’s conduct merits some sort of sanction.

Expect more discussion of this, and other matters, when the case resumes in court on Friday. Opening arguments from both Apple and Samsung took place on Tuesday, as did testimony from Apple’s first witness, designer Christopher Stringer. Apple Senior VP Phil Schiller is set to retake the stand on Friday, after answering just a few questions before court adjourned for the day.

If you need a refresher of what’s at stake in the case, here is our handy cheat sheet. And, yes, AllThingsD is getting up early so we can be in court when things kick off on Friday.


Apple versus Samsung Full Coverage

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I think the NSA has a job to do and we need the NSA. But as (physicist) Robert Oppenheimer said, “When you see something that is technically sweet, you go ahead and do it and argue about what to do about it only after you’ve had your technical success. That is the way it was with the atomic bomb.”

— Phil Zimmerman, PGP inventor and Silent Circle co-founder, in an interview with Om Malik