Federal judge denies Verizon request to restrain ex-employee now working for Allied Wireless

Judge denies Verizon request to restrain ex-worker

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — A federal judge at Little Rock says he won’t issue a restraining order against a former employee of Verizon Wireless who went to work for Allied Wireless Communication Corp.

The decision Wednesday by U.S. District Judge James M. Moody came in Verizon’s suit against Lewis E. Langston III. Verizon sought a temporary restraining order to keep Langston from disclosing confidential, proprietary trade-secret information that he obtained while he worked for Verizon.

Langston had worked for Alltel Corp. for 25 years until earlier this year when Verizon bought Alltel in a $28.1 billion deal. Langston resigned from Verizon on Nov. 18 before taking a job as chief information officer of Allied.

Moody said some of the information that Langston has that Verizon claimed was proprietary was apparently widely known in the industry.

As for other, admittedly confidential Verizon information that Langston possesses, the judge said there was no evidence that Langston had disclosed or intends to disclose it. Moody said he found Langston to be an individual of integrity, and cited testimony that Allied does not need the confidential Verizon information that Langston possesses.