Cavner-U.S. Bancorp lawsuit renewed

U.S. Bancorp alleges in a lawsuit that Cavner, her current employer, The Signature Bank, and four other former U.S. Bancorp employees illegally used confidential client lists to solicit business away from U.S. Bancorp, among other allegations.

In a Nov. 30 court order directing the hearing, Judge Richard Dorr wrote, “the court has reason to believe that false representations were made on behalf of defendant Cavner.”

Following the Dec. 7 hearing, Dorr upheld that opinion of misrepresentation on Cavner’s part and determined Cavner should reimburse U.S. Bancorp for some of its legal expenses.

Jay Dade, the Shughart Thomson Kilroy PC attorney representing U.S. Bancorp, said Dorr directed his client to supply him a summary of legal expenses by Dec. 14 to determine an amount of reimbursement.

Despite the setback, Cavner said after the hearing that she looks forward to presenting her side of the story.

“We look forward to the opportunity to present the entire case in the arbitration,” she said. “So far, the proceedings have not been full hearings on the merits of the case.”

Dorr didn’t set any hearing dates to determine if Cavner and the other defendants used confidential client lists illegally.

Dade said that U.S. Bancorp remains confident in its allegations.

“(The lawsuit) is unfortunately a necessary step that U.S. (Bancorp) feels it needs to take, and is taking, in order to protect its customers,” Dade said.

The Signature Bank hired Cavner away from U.S. Bancorp on Sept. 2 after 14 years of service, during which time she helped build an investment portfolio of between $363 million and more than $450 million. The two banks disagree on the portfolio’s value.

U.S. Bancorp filed a lawsuit against Cavner Sept. 8, stating that she “began liquidating customer money market accounts for trading, and then holding the money for deployment at her new firm.” U.S. Bancorp accuses Cavner and her team of conspiring to photocopy confidential client lists as early as May.

The court ruled against U.S. Bancorp’s request for a temporary restraining order on Sept. 14 based, in part, on the defendants’ testimony that they had not illegally used client lists.

David Kunze, The Signature Bank chairman and CEO, declined new comment on the pending litigation, but told the Springfield Business Journal in September, “We are not calling on any of Nadia’s past clients and asking them to come in and move their business and fill out paperwork.”

The case was closed in September, but reopened Oct. 31, at which time U.S. Bancorp added former employees Devona Breeden, Brittney Murray, Steven Clark and Becky Angus to the suit.

After a Nov. 29 hearing, Dorr ordered discovery to resume.

“The court now has cause to believe that Nadia Cavner, with the assistance of at least some of the other defendants, took and used plaintiff USBI’s confidential and proprietary information to her benefit and to the benefit of her new employer,” he wrote in the Nov. 30 order. “There is a strong likelihood that evidence will reflect that she coordinated a copy project of at least a significant amount of USBI’s customer data.”

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