William A. Clarke v. Fisher-Price, Inc.

I'll research this case to build an accurate overview. Let me start with targeted searches.

The first pass was dominated by the unrelated Leapfrog v. Fisher-Price case. Let me dig specifically into this case and the patent.

Let me find the actual opinion text and docket.

I hit my search budget before I could pull the primary docket and opinion text, so here is the overview with explicit sourcing flags where facts rest on a single secondary source.

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Case Overview: Clarke v. Fisher-Price, Inc., No. 3:07-cv-00421 (W.D. Wis.)

Parties. The plaintiff, William A. Clarke, is an individual inventor — the named inventor on U.S. Patent No. 6,038,711 ("Potty training device"), filed April 7, 1999 and issued March 21, 2000. This is not an NPE/PAE assertion pattern: it is a sole inventor enforcing his own patent against a much larger corporate defendant, and there is no indication in the available record of a patent-holding entity, assignment to a monetization vehicle, or serial assertion campaign. The defendant, Fisher-Price, Inc., is the well-known children's toy manufacturer (East Aurora, New York), which has been a wholly owned subsidiary of Mattel, Inc. since 1993. [Note: the docket caption appears in at least one secondary source as "Clark v. Fisher-Price" (single "e"); the case metadata supplied to me uses "Clarke," which I treat as authoritative here. Counsel for either side is not verified in the material I could retrieve.]

The accused product and asserted patent. Clarke alleged that Fisher-Price's "Fun To Learn Potty" — a toddler potty-training product — infringed the '711 patent. As described in the court's summary-judgment analysis, the accused device included a hollow back member housing sound electronics and, on actuation of a pivotable handle, played a descending marimba sequence that Clarke argued imitated a toilet flush (the device also announced "you flushed the potty"). The '711 patent claims, in technical sketch, a potty chair styled as a miniature toilet: a self-standing stool/seat with an attached generally rectangular back member resembling a toilet tank; a flush handle that produces a simulated flushing sound (the specification emphasizes there is no electrical component in the waste path); child-attracting elements such as decals, a "smiley face" under the lid, and an optionally clear tank with suspended items; and a two-phase reward system — a clear-windowed storage compartment for candy, stickers, or toys, plus a displayable trophy. Only claims 1 and 15 were asserted. Claim 1 recites the stool and hollow back member with structure "for allowing items which encourage usage to be positioned therein"; claim 15 is directed to the simulated flush-sound feature.

Procedural posture, venue, and significance. Suit was filed in 2007 in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin; the "3:" case-number prefix denotes the court's Madison docket. A Studicata case summary attributes the 2008 opinion to Judge John C. Shabaz (W.D. Wis.) — I could not independently confirm that attribution and flag it as unverified. On the merits as reported: the court construed "items which encourage usage" broadly, rejecting Fisher-Price's narrowing to a mere reward cubby so that the accused device's sound electronics fell within claim 1, and granted summary judgment of infringement on claims 1 and 15 (with the "simulated sound of a flushing toilet" limitation on claim 15 characterized as a jury question). The court denied summary judgment of invalidity: neither the Blount patent nor the "Cabbage Patch potty" anticipatory reference disclosed all elements, and genuine disputes over the level of ordinary skill and a motivation to combine precluded summary judgment on obviousness. Venue mattered modestly: W.D. Wis. was the plaintiff's home district, a low-volume patent docket without local patent rules, and not a magnet venue — though its relatively short time-to-disposition made it attractive for a small patentee. As to notability, this is a low-footprint case: I found no contemporaneous Law360, IPWatchdog, Reuters Legal, or RPX coverage, and I could not verify final disposition, damages, appeal, or settlement. Its main contextual interest is timing — it was decided in the immediate wake of KSR Int'l Co. v. Teleflex Inc. (Apr. 30, 2007), when district courts were granting obviousness summary judgment more freely, making a denial on disputed motivation-to-combine facts notable. There is no IPR linkage; inter partes review did not exist until September 16, 2012, and the '711 patent's term would have run from its April 7, 1999 filing to April 7, 2019 (assuming maintenance fees were paid), leaving no practical AIA-review window. Finally, note that Fisher-Price was a repeat defendant in children's-toy patent litigation in this era, but the well-known Leapfrog Enterprises, Inc. v. Fisher-Price, Inc., 485 F.3d 1157 (Fed. Cir. 2007) — a KSR-era obviousness decision — involves a different patent (U.S. 5,813,861) and is not this case.

Sourcing caveats. The core narrative above rests principally on a Studicata case summary of the 2008 W.D. Wis. decision, supplemented by the '711 patent text (FreePatentsOnline/EveryPatent/Google Patents) and later patents citing Clarke. I was unable to retrieve the PACER docket, the opinion's Westlaw/F.Supp. citation, or any CourtListener RECAP copy. Judge name, docket entry numbers, filing/decision dates, counsel, and final disposition (trial, settlement, dismissal, or appeal) should therefore be treated as unverified pending a docket pull.

I'll research this case systematically using web searches.

Important research caveat

I hit my search-step limit before I could pull the PACER docket sheet for this case directly. What follows distinguishes verified findings from unverified/secondary-source findings. The public record on 3:07-cv-00421 is unusually thin — it is a short-lived 2007–2008 pro-se-style patent case from a district whose older dockets are poorly indexed online — so I have flagged every point where I am relying on an AI-generated case summary (Studicata) or a docket aggregator rather than a primary document. No docket entry numbers, opinion citation (F.3d/F. Supp. 2d), or attorney names below are verified, and I have not invented any.

One naming note: the case was filed as Clarke v. Fisher-Price, but the 2008 judicial summary is captioned Clark v. Fisher-Price. Treat "Clarke/Clark" as the same plaintiff.

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Bottom line

Verified/near-verified: A patent infringement suit on US 6,038,711 ("Potty training device," invented by William A. Clarke, filed 1999-04-07, issued 2000-03-21) against Fisher-Price over the accused "Fun To Learn Potty." Filed in the W.D. Wis. on 2007-08-02; docket aggregators show the case as Closed on 2008-01-30. The case was decided (or at least substantially framed) on cross-motions for summary judgment before Judge John C. Shabaz, with claim construction folded into that ruling, resulting in summary judgment of infringement for Clarke on claims 1 and 15 and denial of summary judgment on obviousness. No trial verdict, no appeal, and no PTAB proceeding are documented.

Unverified: post-SJ resolution (settlement vs. consent judgment vs. dismissal), any damages award, the existence of counterclaims, and any reexamination of the '711 patent.

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Chronological developments

1. Pre-suit: the patent

• 2000-03-21 — US 6,038,711 issues to William A. Clarke (application filed 1999-04-07), titled "Potty training device." Claim 1 covers a self-standing stool with a hollow back member (toilet-tank form) and structure "for allowing items which encourage usage to be positioned therein." Claim 15 adds a simulated toilet-flush sound actuated by a pivotable handle. (Google Patents listing; corroborated by the court summary.)

2. Filing and initial pleadings

• 2007-08-02 — Complaint filed: Clarke v. Fisher-Price, Inc., No. 3:07-cv-00421, U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin (Madison). Cause of action: patent infringement. (Docket aggregator; the aggregator tags the case sector as "Mech Eng, Manuf" and the patent-owner party as an operating company.)
• Answer / counterclaims — NOT VERIFIED. The substance of Fisher-Price's responsive pleading appears in the record only indirectly: Fisher-Price contested non-infringement and invalidity and moved for summary judgment on both.

I'll research the counsel of record for the plaintiff in this case.

Counsel of Record — Plaintiff William A. Clarke (W.D. Wis. 3:07-cv-00421)

Bottom line: I could not verify any attorney of record for the plaintiff from the sources retrievable in this session. I am not going to name counsel by inference or guesswork, because on this record any name I supplied would be fabricated. Below is what I did confirm, what I could not, and exactly where the answer is likely to be found.

What is confirmed

Two observations worth flagging:

1. The docket mirror shows the case closed on 01/30/2008 — roughly consistent with a post-summary-judgment resolution (settlement or voluntary dismissal) rather than a trial. The "final disposition unverified" status in the case metadata is therefore still unresolved; the docket itself, not a summary site, is needed to confirm.
2. Name discrepancy: the docket style is "Clarke, William A.," while the published opinion is captioned Clark v. Fisher-Price, Inc. Any counsel search should be run under both spellings.

What I could not verify

• No attorney names for either side were surfaced. Searches for the case caption, the case number, the patent number (6,038,711), the accused product ("Fun To Learn Potty"), and the 2008 W.D. Wis. opinion returned only (a) the docket-mirror stub, (b) a secondary opinion summary with no counsel listing, and (c) irrelevant results (a Knorr-Bremse willfulness article; an unrelated Fisher-Price product-liability practitioner profile).
• No PACER docket sheet, no firm press release, no Law360/Reuters coverage, and no counsel-caption block from a reporter version of the opinion was retrievable here.
• This is a 2007–2008 case, pre-dating the general availability of free docket APIs, which is the most likely reason counsel data is not indexed.

Where the answer actually lives (recommended verification steps)

1. PACER docket for 3:07-cv-00421 (W.D. Wis.) — the "Attorneys" tab and the complaint caption block are dispositive. Note that a litigant proceeding pro se is a live possibility for an individual inventor-plaintiff; the docket will show "PRO SE" if so, and in that event there is no counsel of record to list.
2. The reporter version of the summary-judgment opinion. Westlaw (F. Supp. 2d) and Lexis print a counsel-caption block listing plaintiff's and defendant's counsel and firms. The Studicata-style free summary I retrieved omits it. Search: Clark v. Fisher-Price, Inc., No. 07-cv-421, 2008 WL ______ (W.D. Wis.).
3. The Jan. 30, 2008 closing entry — a stipulation of dismissal or settlement order will be signed by plaintiff's counsel and will name the firm and office.
4. Fisher-Price's defense counsel (likely a Madison/Milwaukee IP firm or Mattel in-house) can be identified from the same caption block; their pleadings will refer to "plaintiff's counsel" by name.
5. Free secondary checks: CourtListener/RECAP (may have a crowdsourced docket scan), Justia Dockets, and the W.D. Wis. CM/ECF historical records.

On the attorney-experience portion of your request

Because I have no name to attach it to, I am not supplying firm affiliations, office locations, or "notable past cases" for any individual — doing so without a name would be invention, which your instructions prohibit. One of the search hits did surface a Michael A. Trunk (Kline & Specter, Philadelphia), who has handled Fisher-Price/Mattel matters, but those were the 2020s Rock 'n Play infant-injury product-liability cases — a different litigation, different decade, different subject matter, and not this patent suit. I mention it only to note that I checked it and it does not match; he should not be listed as counsel here.

If you can pull the PACER docket sheet or a Westlaw counsel caption for the 2008 opinion and paste it in, I will build the full counsel table (name, role, firm, office, experience) immediately.

I'll research the docket and counsel for Fisher-Price in this case.

Let me dig deeper into the docket and counsel records.

Counsel of record — verification status: unable to confirm from sources retrieved

I was not able to retrieve a docket entry or opinion text that names Fisher-Price's counsel in this case. Rather than guess, here is exactly what I could and could not verify, plus the specific next step that will resolve it.

What the record confirms

• Case: Clarke (docketed/opinion style "Clark") v. Fisher-Price, Inc., No. 3:07-cv-00421 (W.D. Wis.), filed 08/02/2007, nature of suit "Patent Infringement," assigned to Judge John C. Shabaz. The docket-aggregator entry I located shows the case closed 01/30/2008. (aggregator docket summary)
• Merits opinion: Clark v. Fisher-Price, Inc., W.D. Wis. 2008 (Shabaz, J.) — summary judgment of infringement of claims 1 and 15 of US 6,038,711 on the "Fun To Learn Potty," with obviousness/anticipation (Blount patent; "Cabbage Patch" potty) denied and left for trial. (Studicata case summary)

What I could not verify

• No attorney names. The only docket mirror page I reached exposes an "Attorney" data field but did not render the names. My searches for a RECAP/CourtListener docket sheet for wiwd 3:07-cv-00421 returned a different case (3:15-cv-00421, the Wisconsin redistricting litigation, docket no. 37044) and unrelated PTAB/Fish & Richardson attorney lists — none of which are this case's counsel.
• I therefore have no basis to name any lead counsel, local counsel, or in-house attorney for Fisher-Price here. I am not asserting any firm of record.

How to confirm definitively (the authoritative sources)

The counsel block will be on two documents that are not yet in the free sources I could reach:

1. PACER / ECF docket for 3:07-cv-00421 (W.D. Wis.) — look for the "Attorney Appearance" entries (roughly Aug.–Oct. 2007) and the "Attorneys" caption block on the summary-judgment briefs (Dkt. ~20–40).
2. The published opinion's counsel line. Westlaw/Lexis print Clark v. Fisher-Price, Inc. with the "Counsel:" headnote listing "…for Plaintiff" and "…for Defendant." Free mirrors of the opinion (CourtListener, Google Scholar) typically truncate that block.

Contextual note (not a finding of record)

Fisher-Price is a Mattel, Inc. subsidiary, and Mattel historically centralized patent litigation in its El Segundo, CA legal department with national IP litigation firms plus Wisconsin local counsel. That is background only — I am not attributing any specific firm or attorney to this matter, because I have no source for it.

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If you can share the PACER docket text or the opinion's counsel line, I'll normalize it into the lead/local/of-counsel/in-house table with firm offices and experience notes.