“…all information of a confidential nature and not in the public domain about the [Claimant’s] trading activities, customers and personnel, information which has been given to the [Claimant] in confidence by clients and third parties, and all information provided to the [Defendant] (or any of them) on a confidential basis.”
“57. Due to health and personal circumstances, I will not be attending the trial in person. 58. I have therefore taken care to set out my evidence fully, clearly, and transparently in this witness statement.”
“Details about the trading activities, personnel and all other commercial information relating to [the Claimant]”
“1.1 In this Agreement, unless the context otherwise requires, the following expressions have the following meanings: “Confidential Information” means the information outlined in Schedule 1 and any further information designated at or before the time of disclosure by [the Claimant] as confidential, whether or not such information is of a commercially (or other) sensitive nature, and in whatever tangible or intangible form the information exists or is communicated. “Stated purposes”
“7.2 In June 2025, I logged on to my personal laptop at the same time as my Hatton's work laptop and I manually inputted into an excel spreadsheet on my laptop around 70 customer details from my Hattons issued work laptop. These included the customer's name, phone number, date of birth if there was one, e-mail address if they had one, and home address. I did this because I was contemplating working for the First Defendant, The Knightsbridge Collection Limited (Knightsbridge) when I had left the employment of Hatton's but I was not thinking clearly or rationally at the time. However after a couple of days, I heard on the grapevine that Hattons had become aware of Knightsbridge. This made me realise that inputting the details onto my personal laptop had been the wrong thing to do and so I asked one of my friends (not a defendant in these proceedings) to wipe my personal laptop. No confidential information of Hattons, including customer information, and any record of such information is contained on that laptop. I also confirm that I did not do anything with the customer information or the excel spreadsheet. I did not provide it to any of the other defendants.”
“….to some of the other Defendants at a time when I was suspended by Hattons. This was in May 2025 and because I wanted to help them prepare evidence in support of the grievance claim. I do not know what information was accessed by those individuals on those occasions but I certainly do not recall any suggestion of taking Confidential Information for the benefit of Knightsbridge.”
“…..decided I wanted to explore working for Knightsbridge at this point. I therefore spent 5 or 6 days at Knightsbridge, seeing how I got on selling coins. Whilst there, Knightsbridge gave me the ability to download to my mobile phone and app which to the best of my recollection, was called Elite. This app contained individual names and telephone numbers, and I called these numbers to try and sell coins. I do not know how Knightsbridge compiled this list of names, but I assumed that it was all above board, and that Knightsbridge had purchased the customer information and built up that information by attending marketing and sales events such as coin fares (sic). I do not therefore know whether any of the individuals on the list are Hattons’ customers. However if they were, this is not a result of any of my actions.”
“3.3 [The Eighth Defendant] had worked at “Hattons”, a well-established coin dealer until October 2022, when he left due to illness. During his term of employment, he had gained valuable experience in buying and selling coins. 3.4 In September 2024, [the Eighth Defendant] was approached by a group of friends to incorporate The Knightsbridge Collection Limited. These friends also worked for “Hattons”, it was the intention for them subsequently to join the Company as shareholders once the Company was established.”
“Hello Nick Harvey. Your channel #Sales Team has been approved by @Benjamin Bradshaw and is now open for everyone in the organisation to join” o. On15 April 2025 , the Eighth Defendant used the Cliq system to inform the Seventh Defendant that he had shared a document with him on the Zoho platform entitled “Payment Sheet”; p. On17 April 2025 , the Second Defendant forwarded to the info@ address of the First Defendant, an email from Netinspire with the subject line “Branding Doc” to which a PDF was attached; q. Between 24 April and14 May 2025 , the Third and Eighth Defendants exchanged a number of links on the Cliq system relating to various coins that were for sale on different websites; r. On25 April 2025 , as shown on Cliq, a conversation took place between the Third and Seventh Defendants in the course of which “Steven”, the Seventh Defendant who had adopted the pseudonym “Steven Boyle”, asks “Michael Bailey”, the Third Defendant (who I find has also adopted a pseudonym) if there has been a sale and receives the following response: “no, just told him we had a new release and he said he would be interested to hear about it but isn’t free until 4.45 pm kash said he was a good client before” kash said he was a good client before” s. The reference to “before” demonstrates that the discussion was about one of the Claimant’s customers. The Seventh and Third Defendants then exchange a number of messages up to4 June 2025 relating to various coins that are for sale on a number of different websites; t. Between 28 April and5 June 2025 , the Third and Fifth Defendants shared multiple Cliq messages including references to having called what appear to be the Claimant’s customers; u. On29 April 2025 , Netinspire an invoice to the Second Defendant and to the “info@” address, with the salutation “Hello Andrew”; v. On30 April 2025 , the Sixth Defendant was also added to the phone system, as evidenced by an email for that date which was sent to the info@ address by Liquid 11, the telecommunications company used by the First Defendant; w. On the same day, with both parties using their First Defendant email addresses, the Seventh Defendant sent an email to the Eighth Defendant headed “Details on the Full Silver Sov please”
“Please find results from the test data. Zero connections, some of them don’t even ring out.” ae. On8 May 2025 , the Sixth Defendant, using his First Defendant email address, sent an email to the Eighth Defendant’s personal email address under the subject line “data” and with an attachment named “Ben_Base.xlsx”; af. On8 May 2025 , the Eighth Defendant used Cliq to notify the Sixth Defendant that he had shared a series of documents with him on Zoho including “Orders and Payments” and “Payment Sheet”; ag. On the same day, the Third Defendant (as Michael Bailey) sent a message to the Sixth Defendant referring to two individuals as being “both massive customers” – this can only be a reference to them being customers of the Claimant; ah. On 8-14 May 2025 , the Third and Eighth Defendants exchanged information about coins which were apparently available from Chards or the Royal Mint; ai. On9 May 2025 , an email was sent by yet another telecommunications company, 8 x 8 to the Third Defendant at his First Defendant email address headed “Welcome to the Team” and stating that “your team created an 8x8 Work account for you”
“Hi Andy Thank you for taking my call this morning. Due to your interest in taking an executive box for the forthcoming season, it is my pleasure to extend an invitation to an exclusive behind the scenes visit to our Clayton Wood training ground.” at. The reference to “Andy” is one to the Second Defendant, as he accepted in his evidence under cross-examination; au. A further email was also sent on 16 May by the Eighth Defendant using to the info@ email address to the Seventh Defendant’s personal email address, forwarding a quotation that had been received from Schui, for the production of business card and letterheads; av. On19 May 2025 , using his First Defendant email address, the Sixth Defendant emailed the other Individual Defendants at their First Defendant email addresses with the following comment: “Please find attached all orders that have been delivered as of today. You can use this to check your own clients and check on their deliveries.”
“Hi Guys Please find attached your data to work from. For the time being please don’t work on any other data than what is in your spreadsheet. You can save data directly to your own computer to keep.” bd. The Claimant accepts that the attachments to the23 May 2025 email are likely to be spreadsheets containing data legitimately purchased from Chic Digital. However, Mr Mellinger has confirmed in his Second Witness Statement, that this data contains information relating to around 7000 individuals, of whom only 33 are/were customers of the Claimant; be. The documents disclosed by the Liquidators included a spreadsheet entitled “Sales Orders” and which appears on the face of it to be a list of all sales made by the First Defendant during the limited period in which it actively sought to trade. It records 176 sales of which 172 match the names of customers of the Claimant. The remaining 4 sales relate to customers who are family members of the Second, Third and Eighth Defendants. Given the almost complete match between the First Defendant’s sales and the Claimant’s customers, it is implausible to suggest that these sales were made using information legitimately obtained through third party sources; bf. In addition, the majority of sales set out in the spreadsheet has the name of one of the Individual Defendants attached to it (under the column heading “Coin ordered”). The obvious inference is that the name is that of the person who is responsible for the sale of the coin to the customer listed on the spreadsheet. I again reject as implausible, the explanations put forward by the Defendants that these were purchases that they had made and that were then to be resold by the First Defendant; bg. On27 May 2025 , the Second Defendant received at his personal email address, an invoice from Netinspire for its work on the First Defendant’s website. The Second Defendant then forwarded this to the info@ email address, presumably to get it to the Eighth Defendant; bh. On28 May 2025 , the Sixth Defendant emailed the Eighth Defendant setting out his views on the compliment slips that had been designed by Schui; bi. On the same day, the same two Defendants appear to have had a lengthy discussion on the Cliq messaging system which included the following: - Sixth Defendant: “are you planning on doing constructive dismissal after the next payday?” - Eighth Defendant: “I don’t know yet mate need to speak to kavi first” bj. The reference to constructive dismissal of course makes no sense if it was in fact the Eighth Defendant who made the comment above as he had left his employment with the Claimant as long ago as4 October 2022 . From this, I conclude that either one of the other Defendants who was still employed by the Claimant as at that date, had logged in as or at the same time as the Eighth Defendant. The reference to constructive dismissal does not make any sense unless it refers to one of those who had not yet left their employment with the Claimant as at28 May 2025 . The evidence strongly suggests that the Second Defendant was the person with whom the Sixth Defendant was in fact communicating as the timing fits only with the point at which the Second Defendant was still employed by the Claimant and had not yet resigned; bk. There is support for that finding set out later in the conversation which records as follows: - Eighth Defendant: “sound mate whose in office?” - Sixth Defendant: "thought you were”; - Eighth Defendant: “its ben but I think pick is on mine aswell lol” bl. The Sixth Defendant then addresses a question directly to “Pick” but using the Eighth Defendant’s name as the recipient. Having been asked the direct question, “Pick” – the Second Defendant – provides a response. It is therefore clear that as at28 May 2025 , the Second Defendant was using the Eighth Defendant’s credentials on the Cliq system and was still considering the “constructive dismissal” route. He then resigned with immediate effect on27 June 2025 ; bm. There is further discussion on Cliq that day between the Sixth and Third Defendants (with the Third Defendant again using the Eighth Defendant’s credentials) in which the following appears: - Sixth Defendant: “there is deffo customers to be had from this big data though, I’m just going to stick with it was well as the bought data, less sales but it would be our bread and butter” - Third Defendant “im only pitching low end as im only running the 8th buyers – no point in hammering big customers when we’re not desperate for sales now” bn. The references to “big data” and “big customers” only make sense as being references to information and customers of the Claimant; bo. That however is not the end of the conversation that morning as the two continue as follows: Third Defendant: “it’s amazing how much better I feel everyday knowing I’m out of [Hattons] honestly, I’m like a different person Sixth Defendant: “yeh massively, although I would like to talk about getting paid soon”
“As detailed at the outset of this letter, the Claimant is hereby granting you this one and only opportunity to admit liability of this claim with relief to be determined and assessed by the Court.”
“It appears to me that the problem is one of definition: what are trade secrets, and how do they differ (if at all) from confidential information? Mr. Poulton suggested that a trade secret is information which, if disclosed to a competitor, would be liable to cause real (or significant) harm to the owner of the secret. I would add first, that it must be information used in a trade or business, and secondly that the owner must limit the dissemination of it or at least not encourage or permit widespread publication. That is my preferred view of the meaning of trade secret in this context.” secrets, and how do they differ (if at all) from confidential information? Mr. Poulton suggested that a trade secret is information which, if disclosed to a competitor, would be liable to cause real (or significant) harm to the trade or business, and secondly that the owner must limit the dissemination That is my preferred view of the meaning of trade secret in this context.”
‘If the managing director is right in thinking that there are features in the plaintiffs' process which can fairly be regarded as trade secrets and which their employees will inevitably carry away with them in their heads, then the proper way for the plaintiffs to protect themselves would be by exacting covenants from their employees restricting their field of activity after they have left their employment, not by asking the court to extend the general equitable doctrine to prevent breaking confidence beyond all reasonable bounds.’
‘The employee might well not realise that the feature or expedient in question was in fact peculiar to his late employer's process and factory; but even if he did, such knowledge is not readily separable from his general knowledge of the flock printing process and his acquired skill in manipulating a flock printing plant, and I do not think that any man of average intelligence and honesty would think that there was anything improper in his putting his memory of particular features of his late employer's plant at the disposal of his new employer.’
‘If the managing director is right in thinking that there are features in the plaintiffs' process which can fairly be regarded as trade secrets and which their employees will inevitably carry away with them in their heads, then the proper way for the plaintiffs to protect themselves would be by exacting covenants from their employees restricting their field of activity after they have left their employment, not by asking the court to extend the general equitable doctrine to prevent breaking confidence beyond all reasonable bounds.’
‘The employee might well not realise that the feature or expedient in question was in fact peculiar to his late employer's process and factory; but even if he did, such knowledge is not readily separable from his general knowledge of the flock printing process and his acquired skill in manipulating a flock printing plant, and I do not think that any man of average intelligence and honesty would think that there was anything improper in his putting his memory of particular features of his late employer's plant at the disposal of his new employer.’
“….where two or more persons combine and take action which is unlawful in itself with the intention of causing damage to a claimant who does incur the intended damage.”
“The unlawful means must have caused loss to the claimant, rather than merely being the occasion of such loss being sustained. As I see it, this is the best explanation of the courier service/pizza delivery example: in that example the claimant’s loss is caused by customers (who may be presumed not to appreciate that the defendant is systematically breaking the law and some of whom may prefer the defendant’s service for other reasons) choosing to place their orders with the defendant, and so the unlawfulness is the occasion for the loss rather than the direct cause of it.”
“unlawful means, both in the intentional harm tort and in the tort of conspiracy, include both crimes and torts (whether or not they include conduct lower on the scale of blameworthiness) provided that they are indeed the means by which harm is intentionally inflicted on the claimant (rather than merely incidental to it).”
“…a conspiracy may be directed against the claimant notwithstanding that its predominant purpose is not to injure him but to further some commercial objective of the defendant.”
“It follows that Straits [the Defendant] sought to advance its own business by pursuing a course of conduct which it knew would, in the very nature of things, necessarily be injurious to MCM [the Claimant] and to western financiers such as MCM. Straits’ state of mind accordingly satisfies the mental ingredient of the tort.”
“An important reason why that is so is that the House of Lords in OBG rejected a narrow and specific test of intention which requires targeting of the claimant. Instead, it laid down a test of intention which includes intending harm as a means to an end, such as enrichment. Consequences that are the necessary means by which the defendant’s aim is achieved are taken to be intended. In the economic context of the unlawful means tort this may operate very broadly. Competition is the essence of trade and it involves gain at the expense of others.”
“In order for A to be liable in tort for inducing B to breach a contract with C, the following requirements must be satisfied: (1) there must be a breach of contract by B; (2) A must induce B to break the contract with C by persuading, encouraging or assisting them to do so; (3) A must know of the contract and know that their conduct will have that effect; (4) A must intend to induce the breach of contract either as an end in itself or as the means to achieving some further end; and (5) A must have no lawful justification for that conduct.”
“…did the defendant’s acts of encouragement, threat, persuasion and so forth have a sufficient causal connection with the breach by the contracting party to attract accessory liability?”
“If A’s conduct is not capable of influencing a choice by B whether or not to breach the contract, it is not capable of amounting to inducement; it cannot operate on the mind or will of B so as qualify as causative participation as an accessory to his breach.”
“Generally speaking, inducement, incitement or persuasion to infringe must be by a defendant to an individual infringer and must identifiably procure a particular infringement in order to make the defendant liable as a joint infringer.”
“In the Lumley v Gye tort, there must be an intention to procure a breach of contract. In the unlawful means tort, there must be an intention to cause loss. The ends which must have been intended are different. … one may intend to procure a breach of contract without intending to cause loss. Likewise, one may intend to cause loss without intending to procure a breach of contract. But the concept of intention is in both cases the same. In both cases it is necessary to distinguish between ends, means and consequences.”
“3A. —(1) In this Part “database” means a collection of independent works, data or other materials which— (a) are arranged in a systematic or methodical way, and (b) are individually accessible by electronic or other means.”
“13. —(1) A property right (“database right”) subsists, in accordance with this Part, in a database if there has been a substantial investment in obtaining, verifying or presenting the contents of the database.”
“(1) Subject to paragraphs (2) to (4), the person who takes the initiative in obtaining, verifying or presenting the contents of a database and assumes the risk of investing in that obtaining, verification or presentation shall be regarded as the maker of, and as having made, the database. (2) Where a database is made by an employee in the course of his employment, his employer shall be regarded as the maker of the database, subject to any agreement to the contrary.”
“(1) Subject to the provisions of this Part, a person infringes database right in a database if, without the consent of the owner of the right, he extracts or re-utilises all or a substantial part of the contents of the database. (2) For the purposes of this Part, the repeated and systematic extraction or re-utilisation of insubstantial parts of the contents of a database may amount to the extraction or re-utilisation of a substantial part of those contents.”