Intellectual Property Law

New York Times on Economic Espionage

Posted on April 21, 2008
There's an old joke that once the New York Times or Time Magazine reports on a trend, it's over.Well, here's hoping that's the case with respect to economic espionage, especially the Chinese variety, which is detailed in this piece from Sunday's paper, "A Spy?s Motivation: For Love of Another Country...

Lew Racing Sues Edge Composites Over Alleged "Secret Process" Theft

Posted on April 18, 2008
A Nevada court has delayed ruling on a request by the owners of Lew Racing to bar competitor Edge Composites from displaying or selling products that Lew alleges were made using a ?secret process? it developed.Paul Lew and Lee Vaccaro, the owners of Lew Racing, filed suit in Clark County, Nevada, seeking damages and a permanent injunction to keep Edge, owned by former Lew employee Jason Schiers, from producing carbon fiber products using Lew?s so-called ?secret process,? which Lew says he developed and protected with non-disclosure agreements...

Electric Sports Car Maker Tesla Motors Sues Fisker Coachbuild for Trade Secrets Theft

Posted on April 16, 2008
Tesla Motors, the Silicon Valley maker of electric sports cars, filed suit in San Mateo Superior Court on Monday against a competing company and two of its employees, saying they stole some of Tesla?s design ideas and trade secrets.Tesla, which has generated much interest among fans of cars and technology, recently started shipping a two-seat electric sports car in limited quantities...

Friday Historical Vault: Mother Jones Says CIA Prepared to Aid in Trade Secret Theft for American Companies

Posted on April 11, 2008
Well, it's Friday and there's little going on in the trade secrets world. That being the case, we thought we'd link you in to a fascinating article from 1994 in which Mother Jones contributor Robert Dreyfuss suggests that the CIA was gearing up to assist private businesses to engage in economic espionage...

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Defense Contractor Employee Pleads Guilty to Stealing Aircraft Fuel Bidding Secrets

Posted on April 10, 2008
A U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) contractor from Baltimore pleaded guilty today to conspiringto steal competitive information concerning contracts to supply fuel to DOD aircraft at locations worldwide, the Department of Justice announced. Matthew W...

Good Hands Trade Secrets: Allstate Releases Data on How it Sets Rates

Posted on April 08, 2008
The Chicago Tribune has reported Allstate's release of the documents was on the heels of an appeals court ruling in Florida on Friday that upheld the regulator's suspension in January of the insurer from writing new policies in the state until it complied fully with subpoenas seeking information about how it sets rates...

Federal Judge Permits Bear Stearns Producer to Work for Morgan Stanley - No Preliminary Injunction on Alleged Confidential Information Theft

Posted on April 08, 2008
Portfolio Media is reporting that a judge has denied a bid by Bear Stearns & Co. Inc. for a preliminary injunction in a case it brought to fight a move by one of its Boston-based executives to rival Morgan Stanley & Co. Inc.Judge Nathaniel M. Gorton of the U...

Lubrizol Trade Secrets Allegedly Stolen By Kyung J. Kim for South Korean Competitor

Posted on April 07, 2008
After an internal investigation at specialty chemical maker Lubrizol, federal authorities have charged a former company employee with theft of trade secrets and conspiracy. Kyung J. Kim, a one-time senior R&D associate at Lubrizol's Brecksville, Ohio, facility, is accused of selling confidential company information to SK Chemicals of South Korea...

Pulte Homes Accuses Former Employee of Stealing Confidential Strategic Plan for Developing Albuquerque Properties

Posted on April 07, 2008
Pulte Homes claims in a federal lawsuit that a top executive who was being laid off stole a highly confidential, $1 million Albuquerque market study and used it to create a similar report for a major competitor.The lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court alleges that Lynn Galindo, a former area vice president based in Las Vegas, Nev...

Coca-Cola Trade Secrets Case -- The Denouement

Posted on April 06, 2008
It's over. I'm talking about the inevitable appeal of the conviction of Joya Williams who was convicted last year of stealing Coca-Cola's trade secrets and trying to sell them to Pepsi.The Eleventh Circuit pretty quickly disposed of Williams claims of legal error, none of which related to trade secrets per se...

Misappropriation Trial of Chinese-American Aerospace Engineer Delayed

Posted on April 02, 2008
A judge agreed Monday to postpone for 13 months the trial of a Chinese-American engineer charged with stealing military and aerospace trade secrets on behalf of China.Kenneth Miller, the attorney for 72-year-old Dongfan "Greg" Chung, asked for the delay because he is involved in a lengthy trial, said Assistant U...

Economic Espionage -- South Koreans Getting Into the Act

Posted on March 27, 2008
From the Cleveland Plain Dealer, a story concerning an alleged case of criminal trade secrets misappropriation by a former research and development associate at Lubrizol. The researcher, Kyung Kim, stands accused of of selling company trade secrets to a South Korean competitor, SK Chemicals -- allegedly meeting SK officials 17 times over a seven-year period...

Turnabout? Fair Play? Americans Stealing Russian Oil Trade Secrets?

Posted on March 24, 2008
A man-bites-dog story from the Times of India, concerning economic espionage with the Americans and British allegedly stealing Russian trade secrets. Russia's internal security agency announced the arrest of two Russian-Americans for their alleged involvement in economic espionage, a day after the raids on the offices of British oil major BP...

"No Secrets in Beer"

Posted on March 10, 2008
From the Aurora (IL) Beacon-News, we thought we'd start off the week with something a little up-beat. It's the story of the two Ebel brothers who turned their home brewing hobby into a retail business.The brothers don't mind sharing their recipes with people who ask...

Microwave Technology For Sale? Oops - That'll Get You Prison Time

Posted on February 29, 2008
Allen Cotten apparently worked for Genesis Microwave Inc. in El Dorado Hills, and admitted that beginning in February 2004 he began to steal plans, designs, parts and specifications for components known as logarithmic video amplifiers. The technology has military applications for radar jamming, guidance, countermeasures and locating enemy signals during combat...

The New Era of Cloak and Dagger in the U.S.

Posted on February 28, 2008
From Family Security Matters, an interesting article by Jim Kouri, who is currently vice-president of the National Association of Chiefs of Police. He writes about the recent spate of economic espionage cases and particularly about what appear to be the concerted efforts by China to steal America's trade secrets.

D.C. Circuit Bars Air Force From Disclosing Contractor?s Pricing Information in Response to FOIA Request

Posted on February 25, 2008
From our brethren at the Unfair Business Practices Blog, a summary of an important DC Circuit decision on trade secrets in the context of a FOIA request from an unsuccessful bidder on a federal contract.

Nice Summary of the Boeing Case and it Larger Meaning

Posted on February 19, 2008
From The Conservative Voice, an excellent summary of the Boeing case initially reported by us here. The article also summarizes last week's economic espionage case out of New Orleans.

Trade Secrets at Risk in International Travel?

Posted on February 13, 2008
InfoWorld has just posted an interesting piece on the possibility that data is being obtained by U.S. Customs in the travel process and that trade secrets are at risk in these exchanges. We've not examined this issue yet on Womble Trade Secrets so we'd thought you should take a look at Mr...

Tom Cruise Scientology Video - A Religion's Trade Secret?

Posted on February 11, 2008
Boston University's The Daily Free Press is reporting that 200 protesters stood in front of Boston's Church of Scientology to protest recent actions of the church in allegedly threatening people with cease and desist letters in connection with a release of a confidential marketing video featuring Tom Cruise, seen here: http://gawker...

Boeing Engineer Arrested for Stealing Aerospace Trade Secrets for China

Posted on February 11, 2008
A former Boeing engineer was arrested on Monday on charges of stealing trade secrets for China related to several aerospace programs, including the Space Shuttle, the U.S. Justice Department said.http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-biz-boeing-space-shuttle-ba-spy-0211feb11,1,1242946...

Trade Secrets All in the Head

Posted on February 07, 2008
Can you state a claim for a trade secrets case based solely on the fact that the person walked out with the trade secrets in his or her head? In Ohio at least, the answer is "yes."From the Associated Press, via Dayton, Ohio television station, WDTN:The Ohio Supreme Court ruled yesterday that memorizing a company's trade secrets is just as wrong as writing them down or copying them in some other format...

Florida's VP Gables Sues Washington's Cobalt For Trade Secret Theft

Posted on February 06, 2008
Fox Business is reporting that VP Gables, LLC (formerly known as VinPlus, LLC), a previous provider of data management solutions, today announced that it has filed a complaint against The Cobalt Group, Inc., a provider of automotive marketing services headquartered in Seattle, Washington...

NFL and Trade Secrets

Posted on February 06, 2008
This posting follows up on Todd's from yesterday:The wheels are coming off the economy and we're in a protracted war in Iraq and so Congress is taking the bull by the horns and investigating . . . possible cheating in the NFL.Now Sporting News, too, weighs in with an article indicating that the main allegations in "Spygate" -- the contention that the New England Patriots may have improperly taped the defensive sideline signals and practices of their opponents -- may violate the federal Economic Espionage Act...

Did Bill Belichick and the Patriots' Video Guy Violate the Economic Espionage Act?

Posted on February 05, 2008
Did any of you know that The Sporting News has a legal consultant? Well, we didn't either. His name is Mike Florio and he's just posted a fascinating idea on the blog - that the Spygate actions of New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick may have violated the Economic Espionage Act of 1996...

Mebane (NC) Firm Accuses Scientist of Taking Trade Secrets

Posted on February 03, 2008
From the Burlington (NC) Times News, and posted without editorial comment since it's Todd's case.

Mississippi Trade Secrets Mess

Posted on January 31, 2008
Mississippi state courts are in an unholy uproar over a bribery scandal relating to one of the state's top plaintiff's lawyers, Dickie Scruggs, and claims of payoffs to state judges. (The New York Times had a lengthy recent -- and eye-opening -- article on the scandal...

Trade Secrets of Breathalyzers - Kentucky Gets in On The Act

Posted on January 31, 2008
The Kentucky Court of Appeals has apparently reversed two lower court rulings that defendants in drunk driving cases cannot test the accuracy of the breathalyzer machines that help convict them.As you can see, this defense strategy is not one limited to Kentucky: http://arstechnica...

Massive Trade Secret Verdict Awarded to Alpha Mining Systems Against Former Employee

Posted on January 31, 2008
The Sarasota Herald-Tribune is reporting a $19.7 million trial verdict in favor of Alpha Mining Systems and against its former employee, Sam Vance. Interestingly, the article reports that Vance did not show up for any court appearance in the matter - thus, suggesting that this was a default judgment that went uncontested...

Cooper Tire Ordered to Give Utah Plaintiffs Access to Records it Deems Trade Secrets

Posted on January 29, 2008
The Salt Lake Tribune is reporting that plaintiffs in a roll-over case received an order from U.S. Magistrate Paul Warner - and affirmed by U.S. District Judge Tena Campbell - for wide access to documents held by Cooper Tire & Rubber Co. It was an order that Cooper Tire, in court filings, calls "breathtaking...

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