Greenberg Traurig Sued for $100M in Malpractice Suit by Ex-Patent Client
Greenberg Traurig and three of its former intellectual property partners are facing a $100 million malpractice suit that clams the firm failed to properly prosecute patents and committed discovery misconduct.
The lawyers named in the suit are Paul Sutton, Barry Magidoff and Claude Narcisse, the New York Law Journal reports. Sutton and Magidoff now have their own law firm.
Greenberg Traurig and Sutton said the claims are without merit.
The suit was filed by Leviton Manufacturing Co. in New York federal court over patents on its ground fault circuit interrupters. Leviton claims Sutton failed to prosecute claims that covered the full breadth of the ground fault technology and filed several patents late, the story says. The suit also claims all three lawyers failed to notify the Patent and Trademark Office about duplication in a patent application, despite being required to do so.
In a suit over the ground fault interrupter, the Greenberg Traurig lawyers were subpoenaed but never showed up for depositions and did not provide documents, according to the suit. A federal judge found discovery misconduct, sanctioned Leviton more than $800,000 and awarded its litigation opponent more than $200,000 for litigating the sanctions motion. Leviton has appealed that decision.
