A federal judge found Apple to be in contempt of an injunction ordering the company to make access to alternative payment options in the company's App Store easier.
A judge's strongly worded contempt order regarding Apple's violation of an injunction in the 2021 Epic Games Inc. v. Apple Inc. antitrust case spells trouble for the consumer tech giant, which is facing a separate antitrust lawsuit from the U.S. Department of Justice.
U.S. District Court Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers in the Northern District of California issued the 80-page contempt order earlier this month, stating that Apple was in "willful violation" of the injunction issued after the company's antitrust trial over its App Store.
In the contempt order, Gonzalez Rogers said Apple's response to the injunction "strains credulity." She accused Apple of covering up its actions, which prompted her to order additional hearings in 2025 using real company documents rather than ones tailored to show the court information Apple wanted to share. She has referred the matter to the U.S. attorney's office in California to consider potential criminal contempt proceedings.
Apple disagreed with the ruling and filed on May 7 with the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit to relieve it of Gonzalez Rogers' injunction. If the court of appeals doesn't stay the order, Apple will have to comply with the injunction.
The contempt order could affect Apple in other antitrust cases it's facing, including the DOJ's antitrust lawsuit accusing Apple of monopolizing the smartphone market. If the DOJ's antitrust case against Apple reaches a remedy phase, the company's past conduct "might come back to haunt it," said Kenneth Dintzer, a partner in law firm Crowell & Moring's antitrust and competition group.
"This case suggested Apple was intentionally hiding documents," Dintzer said. "That might be something that, in other cases, they might refer to and point out."
It's a pattern evidenced in other big tech antitrust cases, said Frank Pasquale, a professor of law at Cornell Law School. The DOJ accused Google of destroying and hiding evidence during its antitrust trial over digital advertising markets, in which Google was found to hold an illegal monopoly. If that had not been the outcome, Pasquale said there likely would have been further inquiry into Google's handling of evidence.
The order from Gonzalez Rogers is a "shot across the bow" at big tech companies regarding compliance with antitrust case outcomes, Pasquale said.
"It's unusual, but it's something we're going to see increasingly if you get this either malicious compliance or real failure to follow through with an order," he said.
Judge accuses Apple of creating new anticompetitive barriers
Gonzalez Rogers largely ruled in favor of Apple in 2021. Epic Games accused Apple of anticompetitive management and pricing mechanisms in its App Store after Apple pulled the game maker's popular Fortnite game.
However, in the injunction, she prohibited Apple from stopping developers from directing customers to payment options outside the App Store. Apple charges app developers up to 30% commission fees for in-app purchases made using the company's payment structure.
Only bad things happen to you if the judge concludes that you're dishonest.
Kenneth DintzerPartner, Crowell & Moring
In the contempt order, she said the company skirted the injunction and continued its anticompetitive conduct by continuing to charge high commission fees and placing new barriers on app developers to dissuade customers from using alternative payment methods.
"Apple willfully chose not to comply with this court's injunction," Gonzalez Rogers wrote. "That it thought this court would tolerate such insubordination was a gross miscalculation."
Gonzalez Rogers provided detailed analysis for every instance she found that Apple chose to ignore the injunction, Dintzer said. The judge also accused executives including Alex Roman, Apple's vice president of finance, of lying under oath about steps the company had taken to comply with the injunction, which does not bode well for the company, he said.
"Only bad things happen to you if the judge concludes that you're dishonest," he said.
What's next for Apple
Potential criminal proceedings against Apple are a separate issue through the attorney's office, which Dintzer said are an "extraordinary remedy."
"Criminal contempt is something you can practice your entire career and not have arise in a case," he said. "I've never had it arise in a civil case that I've worked on in 33 years of practice."
Indeed, finding Apple's offense serious enough to refer it to federal prosecutors as a criminal matter is "highly unusual" in the context of civil antitrust cases, said Prasad Krishnamurthy, professor of law at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law.
"This is a court telling Apple not only is it not in compliance with the order, it's willful and reckless disobeying of the court," Krishnamurthy said.
Krishnamurthy said the Apple contempt order likely puts antitrust defendants on notice that should they flout orders in decided cases, they could have to deal with substantial repercussions.
Makenzie Holland is a senior news writer covering big tech and federal regulation. Prior to joining Informa TechTarget, she was a general assignment reporter for the Wilmington StarNews and a crime and education reporter at the Wabash Plain Dealer.
