SPOKANE — A federal judge in the Eastern District Court of Washington has ruled in favor of several Wenatchee-area farmers in a patent law case involving a variety of cherry tree first developed in Canada.
Chief Judge Stanley Bastian granted a motion from the defendants — Van Well Nursery Inc., Monson Fruit Company, Gordon and Sally Goodwin — to dismiss the case with prejudice on Dec. 30, according to the motion for summary judgement.
The claim, brought forward by the Canadian Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food, was that several Washington growers had violated their patent of a strain of cherry called “Staccato” that ripens later in the year.
This department of the Canadian government operates a tree-fruit breeding program which includes the Staccato cherry. The patent on the Staccato cherry was issued on Dec. 15, 2009, according to the motion.
But license agreements with U.S. farmers were arranged in the 1990s to test and grow as part of their tree fruit breeding program, according to the summary judgement. One test grower of Staccato was Kyle Mathison of Stemilt Inc. in 1995.
Stemilt Inc. had approximately 3.3 acres of land by 2000 and sold 18,200 pounds of Staccato cherries, about $37,000 in total that same year, according to the motion for summary judgement.
The defendants claimed that the patent is invalid because the Staccato cherry was on “sale prior to the ‘critical date,’ which is one year prior to the effective filing date of the patent application,” according to the motion.
Bastian agreed with the defendants in this regard as U.S. patent law prohibits patenting an invention where a commercial sale was made one year or less before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Bastian dismissed the Canadian minister’s claim of patent infringement with prejudice.
