Re: Constitution Requires Jury re Stat. Damages

On 4/1/98, Mac Norton <mnorton[_at_]cavern.uark.edu> wrote:
>
> I'm not quite sure from the summary I read that the constitution
> requires a jury trial,or whether a jury trial is a right in the
> absence of Congressional directive to the contrary.
>
>********************

Clearly a constitutional requirement. The court rejects (8-1) the notion that the statute requires a jury. But it still finds that one is necessary, both on the substantive merits of the trial and on the calculation of damages itself.

This raises an interesting question: the statute says you are entitled to elect statutory damages at any time before judgment -- including after the jury has returned with an award of actual damages. Do I correctly read the case to imply that if a jury comes back with a low actual damages award, and the plaintiff asks for statutory damages instead, the defendant can demand that the statutory damage calculation go to the jury? The same jury that awarded actual damages? Or a reconstituted one (assuming they make the demand several days later)?

Mark A. Lemley
Assistant Professor, University of Texas School of Law Of Counsel, Fish & Richardson, P.C. mlemley[_at_]mail.law.utexas.edu

Berkeley conference on UCC Article 2B, April 23-25 1998: http://sims.berkeley.edu/BCLT/events/ucc2b/

Information on UT's Intellectual Property program: http://www.utexas.edu/law/acadaff/intelprop/

My publications list: http://www.law.utexas.edu/lemley/pubs.htm Received on Wed Apr 01 1998 - 16:55:52 GMT