Indiana

Trade Secrets: Indiana Court of Appeals Issues Opinion Involving Fast Tek

Fast Tek appealed on the issue of the relationship between Indiana's Racketeer and Corrupt Influences (RICO) statute and Indiana's Trade Secrets statute. Actually, I radically condensed the issues for the purposes of my interest in trade secrets.

The Court of Appeals recites the facts and procedural history of the case from pages 3 to 13 (out of 42 pages of the opinion) but this exercise only details the outline published in the press (and reported above in Non-Competition Agreement and Trade Secrets).

Procedurally, we call this kind of appeal an interlocutory appeal. This type of appeal occurs when there is not yet a final judgment. In this case, think of it as an appeal on the preliminary injunction.

The Indiana Court of Appeals examines the history of the Trade Secrets Act's preemption provision. The Court of Appeals also dissects Indiana's RICO statute at 18-20. The opinion hold the trade secrets statute does not preempt use of the RICO statute in conjunction with a trade secrets claim. As the Court of Appeals notes in the opinion, this increases the amount of potential damages. See the opinion at 20 - 21.

I cannot fault the Court of Appeals decision but I tend to be very pro-business in these cases. The policy issues created by the theft of trade secrets fits well with the legal arguments:

Full post as published by Indiana Civil & Business Lawyer on April 18, 2008 (boomark / email).