court to allow this type of disclosure. The seal prohibits the defendant from disclosing even the mere existence of the case to anyone, including its shareholders, a fact which may cause conflicts with the defendant's obligation under Securities & Exchange Commission or stock exchange regulations that require it to disclose lawsuits that could materially affect stock prices. The government may subsequently, without disclosing the identity of the plaintiff or any of the facts, begin taking discovery from the defendant. If the government does not decide to participate in a qui tam action, the relator may proceed alone without the Department of Justice, though such cases historically have a much lower success rate. Relators who do prevail in such cases may potentially receive a higher relator's share, to a maximum of 30%. It is conventionally thought that the government chooses legal matters it would prosecute because the government would only want to get involved in what it believes are winning cases. False patent marking It is an offense under (the "False Marking Statute") to falsely mark goods as "patented" or "patent pending". Before the enactment of the America Invents Act, any person could sue for breach, and the penalty of up to $500 was shared between the government and the person suing. Frequently, patentees fail to remove patent markings from their products following the expiration date of their patents and continue to mark goods sold after that date as patented. This behavior was largely overlooked until a court held that a separate penalty was due for each such article sold. In 2011, the United States District Court for the Northern District of Ohio held that the False Marking Statute was unconstitutional. Judge Dan Aaron Polster determined that it violated the Take Care Clause of Article II of the Constitution, because it represented "a wholesale delegation of criminal law enforcement power to private entities with no control exercised by the Department of Justice". The America Invents Act made significant changes to false marking laws, that affected all pending and future false marking actions: Only the U.S. government can now sue for the civil penalty authorized in § 292. Private entities can still sue, but only for compensatory damages. These plaintiffs must prove actual competitive injury from the false marking. It is no longer a violation to mark a product with an expired patent, as long as that patent once covered the product.