Justice Lucy Koh has not been afraid to bust heads during the Apple (AAPL) v. Samsung (005930) patent trial. On Thursday, she issued an epic smackdown to Apple attorneys who apparently wanted to call an endless parade of witnesses to the stand despite only having just over six hours left to cross-examine Samsung’s witnesses and to call up any remaining witnesses of their own. At one point Koh questioned whether Apple’s lawyers were “smoking crack” for thinking they could get away with their current strategy.
“I am not going to be running around trying to get 75 pages of briefings for people who are not going to be testifying,” Koh said according to CNET. “I mean come on. 75 pages! 75 pages! You want me to do an order on 75 pages, (and) unless you’re smoking crack, you know these witnesses aren’t going to be called when you have less than four hours.”
As BGR has documented before, many prominent jurists have been driven to exasperation by smartphone patent litigation, including Judge Richard Posner, who called one of Apple’s arguments “silly” during a patent suit with Motorola and described the United States patent system “dysfunctional;” and Australian Federal Court Justice Annabelle Bennett, who called Apple and Samsung “ridiculous” and threatened to force the two companies into mediation.
