Articles Posted in 2012

Silicon Valley-based solar panel giant SunPower sued five former employees and competitor SolarCity today, contending that shortly before they left SunPower, the employees connected USB drives to the company’s computer network, “and used them to steal tens-of-thousands of computer files” with confidential and non-confidential proprietary information.

In addition to civil damages and injunctive relief, SunPower also wants to hold the ex-employees criminally liable for violating a California law prohibiting unauthorized computer data access and fraud.

The case raises important questions about what, if any, data loss prevention (DLP) systems were in place to prevent employee theft and the loss of such highly confidential and proprietary data. How could the alleged data transfer of information on hundreds of millions of dollars in sales at a Silicon Valley company occur so brazenly?

Any antitrust concerns about Google’s acquisition of Motorola Mobility were satisfied in Europe and the United States today. Regulatory hurdles were cleared when the European Union and the U.S. Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division each approved Google’s purchase of the telecom unit.

The deal bolsters Google’s patent portfolio, and is anticipated to add substantial value to the company’s Android mobile operating system.

Whitey Bulger, the indicted and apprehended alleged ringleader of Boston’s notorious ‘Winter Hill Gang’ organized crime family, needs “a reasonable amount of time to review a tsunami’s worth of discovery,” according to Bulger’s defense lawyers J.W. Carney, Jr. and and Henry B. Brennan.

The statement was made in a filing with the Massachusetts federal court this morning (read the legal filing below).

Just how much material?

Doug Whitman, the head portfolio manager at Whitman Capital, LLC, was indicted by a New York federal grand jury on insider trading and criminal securities fraud charges (read the indictment below).

The indictment alleges that in 2006 and 2007, Whitman’s firm made $900,000 in illegal profits by trading Google and Polycom stocks using material, non-public information that Whitman himself acquired to make the trades.

Whitman is also charged with buying and selling Marvell Technology Group stock and options over roughly two years using insider information.

Montblanc, the German maker of fabled fountain pens and other luxury goods sued Google for help in unmasking the identities of alleged counterfeiters running Google AdWords campaigns on Google’s UK search engine to hawk knockoff pens.

Montblanc’s lawsuit against Google asks the court for equitable relief, i.e.,, not money but a court order granting the penmaker discovery to unmask and confirm the identity of the person or entity placing misleading ads on Google.

This was kind of a slow week for our Daily Summary writers, but we did have a blockbuster from the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals: Perry v. Brown.  This case involved Proposition 8, which amended the California state constitution to eliminate the right of same-sex couples to marry. The 9th Cir. chose to address the constitutionality of Prop. 8 and declined to address the broader question of whether same-sex couples had the right to marry. As a preliminary matter, the 9th Cir. held that proponents of the ballot measure had standing.  The 9th Cir. held that Prop. 8 was unconstitutional because it violated the Equal Protection Clause by targeting a minority group and withdrawing a right that the group possessed without a legitimate reason for doing so. The court also affirmed the denial of a motion to vacate former Chief Judge Walker on the basis of his purported interest in being allowed to marry his same-sex partner.

The mainstream media extensively covered this case — for more information, check out the New York Times article.

PayPal was hit with a class-action lawsuit today alleging that the company violated a federal communications law by sending consumers unsolicited text messages.

The lawsuit charges PayPal with violating the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, a federal law designed to protect consumers from unwarranted, unsolicited phone communication from automatic telephone dialing systems (read the lawsuit below).

The Federal Trade Commission announced Monday that it warned six (6) mobile app “marketers” that their background screening products may violate the Fair Credit Reporting Act if the makers of the products had reason to believe the reports generated by these products were being used for employment screening, housing, credit, or related purposes.

Yesterday’s press release (see PDF below) however, did not list the names of the either the companies marketing the apps, nor the names of any mobile applications over which the FTC expressed concern.

Repeated inquiries by Justia to the FTC, however, apparently prompted the agency to name them today.

Proposition 8 (‘Prop 8’), the California voter amendment that sought to ban same-sex marriages in the state is unconstitutional, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled in a 128-page opinion issued this morning.

You can read the complete decision below:

Here are some of last week’s highlights from our Daily Opinion Summaries writers.

US v. Strandhof, US Ct. App. 10th Cir., 1/27/12
The 10th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the Stolen Valor Act (18 U.S.C. 704(b)) which makes it illegal to falsely claim to have received a military award or honor. The district court found that appellant’s false claims to a Purple Heart, Silver Star, and rank of Marine Corps captain were protected by the First Amendment, but the 10th Circuit relied on SCOTUS precedent to overturn that ruling.