Youth Sports Group Told to Cut Down Patents in Xerox Suit

Midwest Athletics and Sports Alliance LLC must trim the number of patents in its lawsuit against Xerox Corp. to make the case more manageable, a New York federal judge ruled, a decision Midwest called “unprecedented.”

Judge Elizabeth Wolford in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of New York adopted a magistrate judge’s recommendation to require Midwest to narrow the lawsuit from 20 patents to four patents by trial.

Wolford said four patents was the “maximum that a lay jury could reasonably be expected to understand in a single trial.”

While district courts can make plaintiffs narrow the number ...