Lawyer-Led App Co.

Says Developer Holding Trade Secrets

By Ryan Boysen
Law360, New York (March 3, 2017, 10:11 PM EST) -- Run The Call, a Chicago startu
p that s been described as an Uber for lawyers, hit software developer Gigster with
a suit in Illinois federal court alleging the defendant is refusing to offer a r
efund or return trade secrets after blowing a deadline by eight months two oblig
ations RTC contends were explicitly written into the companies' contract.
Run The Call, which allows lawyers to quickly find qualified sit-ins for court a
ppointments, further alleges Gigster inappropriately accessed a co-founder s email
account and phone, and is seeking an immediate restraining order.
Before RTC pulled the plug, it claims Gigster s CEO referenced RTC s business model
in telling a podcast host that If [Gigster doesn t] mess up, this will be the large
st company founded this decade. You can imagine push a button, get lawyers.
Once defendants discloses (sic) Run The Call s trade secrets, the competitive injur
y to Run The Call cannot be undone, the complaint, filed Friday, says. It could ta
ke months if not years to reach a trial on the merits. In the meantime, defendan
ts will have control over Run The Call s code, capital, and the sensitive trade se
cret information that can help Gigster defendants achieve his vision (sic) of pus
h a button get a lawyer to unfairly compete with Run The Call.
RTC claims it has paid Gigster roughly $92,000 and is suing the firm on over a d
ozen charges, including fraud, professional negligence and violations of the Uni
form Trade Secrets Act and the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.
Jeff Harris, a bankruptcy lawyer and co-founder of RTC, says he s been working 20-
hour days to draft the complaint and prepare additional documents to present in
court Monday morning.
It boggles my mind to no end, Harris told Law360. It s in the contract that they re sup
posed to give us a refund, and they re supposed to give us our code back, and they v
e refused to give us either. It s as cut and dry as you can get.
The suit comes after RTC hired Gigster itself described as an Uber for developers
in October 2015 to build its platform, alleging Gigster blew past a May 2016 dea
dline for completion of the project and then repeatedly missed subsequent deadli
nes, all while allegedly misleading RTC about how much work remained.
Gigster, recently named one of Forbes Next Billion Dollar Startups, brings together
highly skilled freelancers to work on complicated software design projects. Its
novel business model has attracted millions from prestigious Silicon Valley inv
estment shops like Y Combinator and Andreessen Horowitz, but TechCrunch reports
its rapid growth and reliance on freelancers has sometimes led to chaos for clie
nts.
RTC claims Gigster was well aware of the numerous setbacks and delays the projec
t suffered but continued to reassure RTC it was nearly done.
In August, Gigster s CEO Roger Dickey requested a status update and one freelancer
described the project as 9 months old Timelines have all been missed; What code
they have in hand is buggy and not functional, in an internal email RTC claims wa
s sent to it by mistake. The same month, Gigster s chief technology officer said t
he company was working on the project and asked RTC to adopt a more positive atti
tude, but the next month Gigster determined the code was so badly bungled it was ea
sier and more cost-effective to re-write portions of it from scratch, the complaint
states.
RTC contends that shortly before it decided to terminate the contract in January
, Dickey said in an email that if it filed suit it s going to eat up your life to g
o after it, leaving RTC little recourse, the complaint states.
It s obviously a threat, Harris told Law360. 'We re a big giant company and we re going t
o eat up your life.' How else can you take that?
RTC also claims that a Gigster freelancer repeatedly logged into its email in Se
ptember without permission, and the same month someone accessed Run The Call s co-f
ounder s cell phone and caused it to call dozens of other numbers in the Chicago ar
ea, although the precise means by which the phone was accessed remain unclear, the
complaint states.
RTC says Gigster may attempt to use RTC's intellectual property to create a simi
lar service or work with a competitor, both violations of a nondisclosure agreem
ent the parties signed.
The complaint points to a comment Dickey made while on the podcast This Week In S
tartups in December 2015, as a further violation of the that agreement.
This is a very large vision, Dickey allegedly said on the show. We re talking about s
oftware development outsourcing. And ultimately other types of knowledge Push a
button, get lawyers. Push a button, get a team of lawyers.
Gigster did not return a request for comment on Friday.
Counsel information was not available for Gigster.
Run The Call is represented by Gianna Scatchell of Law Offices of Gianna Scatche
ll PC and Jeffrey Harris of The Law Office of Jeffrey Harris, both co-founders o
f Run The Call.
The case is Run The Call v. Liquid Labs et al., case number 1:17-cv-01699, in th
e U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.
--Editing by Jill Coffey.

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Case Information
Case Title
RUN THE CALL INC. v. LIQUID LABS, INC d/b/a GIGSTER et al
Case Number
1:17-cv-01699
Court
Illinois Northern
Nature of Suit
190(Contract: Other)
Judge
Honorable Jorge L. Alonso
Date Filed
March 3, 2017
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Andreessen Horowitz LLC
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