On March 20, a jury issued a complete defense verdict to a Tucker Ellis client following a two-week jury trial. The trial team included lead counsel Nick Clifford and associate Kelly Meredith, with the assistance of counsel Chad Eggspuehler.

The case, which had been pending for nearly five years, included claims for copyright infringement (on which the court granted summary judgment for the defendants before trial), as well as claims for breach of contract, computer tampering, and civil conspiracy. The claims arose out of a family dispute between the owners of a small company that provided services to our client for many years. The plaintiff, believing he had not been paid adequately, sued his mother, his siblings, the family company, a vendor, and the family company’s two biggest clients in federal court.

The jury, which insisted on seeing the case through to verdict despite the challenges presented by the coronavirus pandemic, rejected all of the plaintiff’s claims against our client and the other defendants and awarded compensatory and punitive damages to the family company in its counterclaims against the plaintiff.