{"id":625,"date":"2011-12-29T14:39:01","date_gmt":"2011-12-29T14:39:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bfvlaw.com\/georgia-court-of-appeals-affirms-judgment-against-former-employee-for-breaching-his-duty-of-loyalty\/"},"modified":"2011-12-29T14:39:01","modified_gmt":"2011-12-29T14:39:01","slug":"georgia-court-of-appeals-affirms-judgment-against-former-employee-for-breaching-his-duty-of-loyalty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bfvlaw.com\/georgia-court-of-appeals-affirms-judgment-against-former-employee-for-breaching-his-duty-of-loyalty\/","title":{"rendered":"Georgia Court of Appeals Affirms Judgment Against Former Employee for Breaching his Duty of Loyalty"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span>Sitton v. Print Direction, Inc.<\/span><em>,<\/em> \u2014 S.E. 2d. \u2014, 2011 WL 4469712 (Ga. App. Sept. 28, 2011), involved a peculiar application of some of the claims often at issue in unfair competition disputes between employers and their former employees.<\/p>\n<p>Larry Sitton was formerly employed by Print Direction, Inc. (\u201cPDI\u201d), a commercial printing business.\u00a0 Mr. Sitton was fired when PDI discovered that he was taking part in a competing business on the side of his employment.\u00a0 PDI discovered Mr. Sitton\u2019s conduct while reviewing e-mails on the personal computer he used while at work.\u00a0 While PDI provided Mr. Sitton with a laptop, he chose to use his own computer while at the office.\u00a0 He would bring his computer into the office and then connect it to PDI\u2019s network.<\/p>\n<p>At some point in time, PDI\u2019s President and Chief Executive Officer heard that Mr. Sitton was competing with PDI.\u00a0 He entered Mr. Sitton\u2019s office, moved the mouse on Mr. Sitton\u2019s computer, and clicked on the e-mail listing which appeared on the screen.\u00a0 He then printed certain e-mails from Mr. Sitton which demonstrated that, while he was employed with PDI, he was brokering jobs through a company called Superior Solutions Associates, LLC.<\/p>\n<p>PDI then terminated Mr. Sitton.\u00a0 Oddly, Mr. Sitton then sued PDI, alleging that PDI\u2019s viewing and printing the incriminating e-mails on his computer constituted computer theft, computer trespass and computer invasion of privacy in violation of the Georgia Computer Systems Protection Act, O.C.G.A. \u00a7 16-9-93 (\u201cGCSPA\u201d).<\/p>\n<p>The trial court rejected Mr. Sitton\u2019s claims, finding that PDI\u2019s accessing his computer was not \u201cwithout authority\u201d as required for a violation of the GCSPA.\u00a0 The Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court\u2019s finding that even though the e-mails were found on Mr. Sitton\u2019s personal computer, PDI had authority to inspect the computer pursuant to the computer usage policies in PDI\u2019s employee manual, which Mr. Sitton had agreed to.\u00a0\u00a0 The Court of Appeals pointed to the fact that PDI\u2019s computer usage policy was not limited to PDI-owned computer equipment and it specifically stated that employees should not regard electronic mail left on or transmitted over PDI\u2019s systems as private or confidential.\u00a0 The e-mails on Mr. Sitton\u2019s computer which PDI saw were therefore subject to review under the company\u2019s computer usage policy.<\/p>\n<p>Thus, PDI\u2019s actions were not \u201cwithout authority\u201d, and Mr. Sitton\u2019s GCSPA claims failed.\u00a0 The Court of Appeals also observed that there was no evidence that PDI accessed Mr. Sitton\u2019s computer with the intent of taking his property; deleting, altering or damaging any computer data; or examining any personal data.\u00a0 The fact that the requisite intent was lacking was thus another reason that PDI\u2019s viewing the e-mails was not proscribed by the GCSPA.<\/p>\n<p>The Court of Appeals also affirmed the trial court\u2019s ruling denying Mr. Sitton\u2019s claim for common law invasion of privacy.\u00a0 In light of the evidence discussed above, the Court of Appeals agreed with the trial court\u2019s finding that PDI\u2019s review of Mr. Sitton\u2019s e-mails did not constitute such an unreasonable intrusion as to rise to the level of an invasion of privacy.<\/p>\n<p>Mr. Sitton also challenged the judgment against him on PDI\u2019s counterclaim for breach of the duty of loyalty.\u00a0 The Court of Appeals rejected Mr. Sitton\u2019s argument that he did not owe a duty, given that there was evidence in the record that he had authority to solicit business on PDI\u2019s behalf and to bind PDI for certain obligations.\u00a0 The Court of Appeals found that this evidence supported the trial court\u2019s finding that he owed a fiduciary obligation.\u00a0 The trial court also found that the terms of PDI\u2019s employee manual specifically prohibited competition.\u00a0 This fact further supported the trial court\u2019s finding that Mr. Sitton breached his duty of loyalty.\u00a0 The Court of Appeals also rejected Mr. Sitton\u2019s challenges to the trial court\u2019s damages calculations.<\/p>\n<p>This case illustrates the importance of employers being proactive in having robust computer usage, e-mail, and internet usage policies.\u00a0 Such policies may significantly aid an employer in obtaining relief from a court in the event of a rogue former employee like Mr. Sitton.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sitton v. Print Direction, Inc., \u2014 S.E. 2d. \u2014, 2011 WL 4469712 (Ga. App. Sept. 28, 2011), involved a peculiar application of some of the claims often at issue in unfair competition disputes between employers and their former employees. Larry Sitton was formerly employed by Print Direction, Inc. (\u201cPDI\u201d), a commercial printing business.\u00a0 Mr. Sitton [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_mo_disable_npp":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,9],"tags":[28,24,16],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Georgia Court of Appeals Affirms Judgment Against Former Employee for Breaching his Duty of Loyalty - Berman Fink Van Horn P.C.<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bfvlaw.com\/georgia-court-of-appeals-affirms-judgment-against-former-employee-for-breaching-his-duty-of-loyalty\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Georgia Court of Appeals Affirms Judgment Against Former Employee for Breaching his Duty of Loyalty - Berman Fink Van Horn P.C.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Sitton v. Print Direction, Inc., \u2014 S.E. 2d. \u2014, 2011 WL 4469712 (Ga. App. Sept. 28, 2011), involved a peculiar application of some of the claims often at issue in unfair competition disputes between employers and their former employees. Larry Sitton was formerly employed by Print Direction, Inc. 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