Citi sues ex-law firm group bankers over trade secrets
By Sara Merken
Nov 21 (Reuters) -Citigroup C.N sued two San Francisco-based private bankers who recently left the bank for competitor Bank of Montreal's BMO.TO law firm wealth management group, accusing them of improperly taking business and client information to their new employer.
Citibank and Citigroup Global Markets filed the lawsuit on Wednesday in California federal court against John Mitchell and Benjamin Carr. The pair were among about 18 banking, investment and planning professionals who left Citi's Law Firm Group for BMO U.S. Wealth Management in a move announced on Oct. 3.
Mitchell was a managing director and Carr was a senior vice president in Citi Global Wealth at Work's law firm unit, which provides wealth management services to lawyers and their firms. The group works with more than 900 law firms across the country, according to the complaint.
Citi alleged that Carr and Mitchell took or retained confidential and proprietary information when leaving Citi, including clients' cash balances and the maturity dates of savings accounts.
"As this matter is before the courts, we have no comment at this time," BMO said in a statement on Thursday. Mitchell and Carr did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Citi declined to comment.
Citi is seeking a temporary restraining order to prevent the former employees from using its confidential information until a Financial Industry Regulatory Authority arbitration panel rules in a related proceeding. The bank initiated a FINRA arbitration against Mitchell and others on Oct. 28 over the alleged solicitation of Citi employees to join BMO, the complaint said.
Citi accused the bankers of breaching their contracts with Citi and misappropriating trade secrets and confidential information.
Carr "engaged in highly unusual activity" by searching for information related to his clients on Citi's computer system on July 17, two days before the bankers gave notice of their resignation, the lawsuit alleged.
Mitchell then allegedly used the information in an attempt to persuade a Citi client to change banks, Citi said. While working at BMO, he sent an email on Nov. 4. to one of his former Citi clients that said he could offer deposit rates at BMO that "are better than Citi," on the same day the client's multi-million dollar certificate of deposit at Citi matured, the lawsuit said.
Mitchell oversaw about 450 law firms and their partners and associates, totaling about $497 million in assets, when he resigned from Citi, the lawsuit said. Carr serviced about 570 law firms and their lawyers with about $152 million in assets.
The case is Citibank, N.A. et al v. Mitchell et al, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, No. 3:24-cv-08224
For Citi: Stacy Fode and Natalie Bryans of Nukk-Freeman & Cerra and Leonard Weintraub of Paduano & Weintraub
For Mitchell and Carr: Not immediately known
Reporting by Sara Merken
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