Experience
Bankruptcy Litigation For Leading Payments Technology Company
Represented Visa in various litigation in bankruptcy cases throughout the U.S., including defending numerous preferential and fraudulent transfer claims in the Brookstone, American Apparel, Sears, Limited Stores, Gordmans and Charlotte Russe cases and defeating efforts to enjoin processing of large scale international transactions in the Galileo Learning and smarTours cases.
Payment Processor for Crypto-currency Business
Representing principal and founder of payment processor company in investigation by Securities and Exchange Commission and U.S. Department of Justice Tax division regarding crypto-currency business and tax activities.
Fintech Executive
Represented a senior financial services executive in internal and Securities and Exchange Commission investigations of financial technology company.
Purple Leaf v. Google, Inc.
Defended Google Checkout in the Eastern District of Texas against assertions that it infringed a patent owned by Purple Leaf that purportedly disclosed a way to conduct an online transaction directly between merchant and buyer. After initial pleadings, we were able to attain a dismissal of the claims against Google.
e-Micro Corporation v. Google, Inc.
Defended Google against allegations that Google Checkout infringes a patent allegedly related to electronic payment transactions conducted on the Internet.
Restricted Spending Solutions v. Allow Card
We won summary judgment of invalidity for our client Visa USA, Inc. in this patent action filed in Chicago asserting a patent over an "allowance" card for teens that can be controlled by the parent. This was a significant victory. Not only is a summary judgment of invalidity rare, but the well-known NPE Acacia was the ultimate owner of the plaintiff and had managed to exact settlements with many of the other eighteen defendants. 743 F. Supp. 2d 954 (N.D. Ill. 2010)(granting summary judgment).
DataTern v Bank of America Corp. et al.
We defended Visa Inc. in a lawsuit filed by DataTern against it and others in the Eastern District of Texas which claimed that Visa was infringing DataTern's ‘402 patent titled "System for enabling access to a relational database from an object oriented program." We obtained a successful settlement of the case for Visa.
Actus LLC v. Bank of America Corp, et al
We defended Sonic Solutions in litigation filed in the Eastern District of Texas by Actus LLC, a patent holding company, that asserted infringement claims on four patents relating to an electronic payments system directed at companies offering prepaid gift cards and online payment options for customers. We were able to obtain an early favorable settlement for Sonic to avoid further costly legal proceedings.
Every Penny Counts, Inc. v. American Express Co., et al.
Defended Visa U.S.A. Inc. in a case where the plaintiff accused Visa’s gift card technology of infringing five patents. We prevailed on a case-dispositive claim construction at the district court, leading to a stipulated judgment of non-infringement on all five patents. The Federal Circuit upheld the claim construction and judgment on appeal. 563 F.3d 1378 (Fed. Cir. 2009). A petition for en banc rehearing and petition for writ of certiorari were both denied.
Visa v. Maritz
Represented Visa in connection with claims against Maritz arising out of Maritz's attempt to develop and deploy a points based rewards program for Visa and its members.
