ST. Louis, Missouri
April 29, 2004
Jim Suhr
Associated Press via
Agnet April
29/04 - II
An appeals court has thrown out the $780,000 in damages a
Mississippi farmer was ordered to pay Monsanto in a seed-patent
dispute, calling the agriculture biotechnology giant's formula
for calculating such damages "unenforceable" under Missouri law.
Under the ruling from a three-judge federal court panel in
Washington, a judge or jury in Missouri must decide what Homan
McFarling actually owes the company for saving and replanting
genetically altered seeds in violation of an agreement with
Monsanto.
The 30-page ruling, issued April 9, affirmed that McFarling, a
soybean grower, infringed on St. Louis-based Monsanto's patent
and breached his contract with the company.
"This ruling once again confirms that Monsanto's market approach
to selling patented seed and traits is legal and enforceable,"
the company said Wednesday. "We now turn our attention to the
jury trial to determine patent-infringement damages independent
of the contract provision."
In November 2002, the St. Louis-based U.S. District Court for
Missouri's eastern district ruled that McFarling violated a
Monsanto-held seed patent and ordered him to pay the company
$780,000 in damages, given his admission that he saved seeds
after harvesting crops grown from Monsanto's patented Roundup
Ready soybean seed.
In agreeing in writing to the prohibition when he first bought
the seeds from Monsanto, McFarling also agreed that if he
breached the deal he would have to pay damages of 120 times the
$6.50-per-bag technology fee the company gets from each bag of
soybeans sold.
Monsanto has filed more than 70 lawsuits against farmers in
recent years over the issue. Monsanto first sued McFarling in
2000.
In its ruling this month, the federal appeals court declared the
120 multiplier "not a reasonable estimate of the harm that would
be anticipated to flow from breach of the prohibition
prohibiting replanting seed."
In a similar case a year ago, a Tennessee farmer opposed to
Monsanto's genetic seed licensing practices was sentenced in a
St. Louis federal court to eight months in prison for lying
about a truckload of cotton seed he hid for a friend.
Kem Ralph's prison term for conspiracy to commit fraud was
believed to be the first criminal prosecution linked to
Monsanto's crackdown on farmers it claims have been violating
agreements on using genetically modified seeds.
Ralph has been ordered to pay Monsanto more than $1.7 million.
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