Free Blood Brothers by Rick Acker Page B

monkeys. Bruce went back into his cage without much complaining, but Tweedledee and Tweedledum were still playing and needed a lot of coaxing. Technically, Kim should have checked the ID number tattooed on each animal’s abdomen to make sure the right monkey went in the right cage, but the numbers were hard to read and the animals didn’t like it. Besides, Kim was pretty sure she could tell them apart.

    Judge Reilly held his emergency-motion call at 8:30 a.m., so Ben and Gunnar arrived in his courtroom at 8:15 and sat on the hard wooden benches while the judge worked through the cases ahead of theirs. At 9:05, the clerk announced, “Bjornsen Pharmaceuticals versus Bjornsen.”
    Bert Siwell and Ben approached the bench and made their appearances. Karl and Gunnar Bjornsen were both in the courtroom and moved to the front benches when the case was called, nodding curtly to each other as they sat down. “Good morning, Counsel,” said the judge. “Between the two of you, you’ve filed no less than eleven emergency motions. Let’s start at the top of the stack. You’ve both moved for TROs. Mr. Siwell, you filed your motion first, so I’ll let you argue first.”
    “Thank you, Your Honor.” Bert Siwell was a large man in height, width, voice, and ego. Thirty years ago, he had played right tackle at Northwestern. He had been a good offensive lineman for the same reason he was a good litigator: he was quick and could overpower most opponents. Also, he knew how to play dirty without getting caught. “My client, Bjornsen Pharmaceuticals, is asking for something that is both simple and crucial: it wants its trade secrets back. That’s all we want in this motion.
    “Some people take Post-its or paperclips home from the office. Gunnar Bjornsen may have taken a multibillion-dollar secret. If he did, his former employer is entitled to get it back, and that’s what we ask for in our injunction papers. In the meantime, though, we’re entitled to know what he’s got. We’re not even asking for him to give anything back at this point. We just need him to disclose what information walked out the door with him. But he won’t do it.
    “Why won’t he do it? That’s a very good question. Maybe he just wants to keep my client in the dark so he can negotiate a better severance package than he deserves. Maybe. But maybe the real reason is that he plans to sell my client’s secrets to a competitor. If that’s his plan, we need to know right now exactly what secrets he took from my client. We ask for a TRO requiring him to make that disclosure immediately.”
    The judge looked at Ben. “Thank you, Your Honor,” Ben said. “This is going to be easier than I thought. My client has no intention of disclosing any secrets to any third parties. We’ll agree to a TRO to that effect. What—”
    “So why won’t he disclose what secrets he took?” asked Siwell.
    Ben suppressed his irritation. It was rude for one lawyer to interrupt another lawyer’s argument or speak directly to his opponent rather than to the judge. Ben glanced up at Judge Reilly, who showed no sign of intervening. Ben continued his argument. “Mr. Siwell’s TRO motion doesn’t just request a list of the information my client allegedly took; he wants the information itself. What Mr. Siwell is asking for is to have his entire case handed to him on a silver platter. The whole purpose of his lawsuit is to force my client to turn over information. A TRO is not intended to be a way to shortcut the litigation process; it is meant to prevent an imminent harm, a wrong that is about to be done and cannot be undone by a later order of the Court. The only thing Mr. Siwell has pointed to that fits that description is the claimed risk that my client will tell the company’s secrets to a competitor. Mr. Bjornsen won’t do that. In fact, he’s willing to agree to an order requiring him not to. That takes care of the plaintiff’s TRO motion. Now—”
    “No it