Kent Raygor

Kent Raygor, a partner in the Century City office, practices in the Business Trial, Intellectual Property, and Entertainment Technology and Advertising groups.

Education :

• J.D., Minnesota Law School (1984, cum laude)
• B.A., University of Minnesota (1976, summa cum laude)

Membership :

• Media Law Resource Center (MLRC)
• Los Angeles Copyright Society
• American Intellectual Property Law Association (AIPLA)
• American Bar Association (ABA)
• State Bar of California (Intellectual Property Section)
• Beverly Hills Bar Association

Experience :

• Complex And Multidistrict Litigation

Defended Honeywell for over 11 years in this extremely complex patent dispute, resulting in a 3-month patent infringement jury trial—the largest patent case in U.S. history at the time. The technology involved thin film physics, laser optics, and materials science.

Following the trial, the Court declared Litton’s patent invalid and overturned a $1.2 billion jury verdict, thus enabling Honeywell to continue its inertial navigation systems business. Following remand from the U.S. Supreme Court, the court granted summary judgment in Honeywell’s favor on all remaining claims.

Defended Gillette in seven class actions before several U.S. District Courts.  The plaintiffs in each case asserted false advertising claims arising out of performance assertions in advertising for Gillette’s M3Power razor. Those cases, along with 23 similar class actions filed around the country, were eventually transferred to the U.S. District Court in Massachusetts for consolidated multidistrict litigation (MDL) proceedings.

Represented FMFC, an agricultural credit association regulated by the Farm Credit Administration, in breach of contract, fraud, breach of warranty, and unjust enrichment claims against a software systems developer that provides data processing services to financial service providers.

Defended Twentieth Century Fox and Digital Domain, an Academy Award®-winning special effects house, in a patent infringement suit involving the special effects in the 1997 film, Titanic.

Represented Northrop Grumman in a multi-party patent infringement action against the leading hearing aid manufacturers.

• Constitutional Law

Represented a developer against a Redevelopment agency concerning a conflict between the Reserved Powers Doctrine and the Contracts Clause.  The tension between those provisions created a problem when, after creating vested rights through an enforceable development agreement, a municipality enacted ordinances rendering the development unlawful.

Represented a developer in an Equal Protection violation action against the U.S. and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers concerning bad-faith and discriminatory conduct in connection with repeated and pretextual refusals to confirm that a residential project proposed by the developer complied with flowage easements and related rights in favor of the U.S.

Defended a magazine in a First Amendment and Right To Privacy case following its republication of nude photographs of Brad Pitt and Gwyneth Paltrow taken by a paparazzo while they were on vacation, which others had previously published in European tabloids.

• Copyright

Defended Screen Gems, Sony, and Rainforest in two copyright infringement and idea submission cases, one over the 2007 film, Stomp The Yard, and the other over the 2005 film, The Gospel. The plaintiffs, faced with the defendants’ summary judgment motions, dismissed their suits.

Defended TigerDirect and CompUSA against claims of copyright infringement by a composer of theme music for the TigerTV consumer electronics series.

• Trademark

Defended Samsung against trademark infringement claims asserted by RIM, which claimed that Samsung’s “BlackJack” and “Black Carbon” smartphones infringed RIM’s trademark rights in the term “BlackBerry”.

Defended Disney and ABC in a trademark suit filed by the owner of rights to the L’il Abner comic strip and characters, over references in the 2001-2004 Lizzie McGuire television series to a “Sadie Hawkins Day” and “Sadie Hawkins Dance.” Obtained a dismissal of the entire action.