Mary Carollo: Trade Secret Litigation

A trade secret is information that derives actual or potential value from not being known to the public and that is subject to reasonable efforts to maintain its secrecy. A trade secret can consist of formulas, patterns, compilations, programs, devices, methods, techniques, or processes. In fact, protection of trade secrets can cover everything from microchip design to religious practices. Some of the most famous examples of trade secrets include the formula for Coca-Cola and the algorithms behind Google’s search engine. However, information does not need to be famous for it to warrant trade secret protection. In fact, many valuable trade secrets are valuable precisely because the public does not know about them.

Every state allows an owner of a trade secret to seek legal relief when that trade secret has been disclosed or used without authorization. Moreover, nearly every state has adopted a version of the Uniform Trade Secret Act, which was originally published by the Uniform Law Commission in 1979. This act sets forth specific requirements and procedures that are unique to trade secret claims. As Utah attorneys, we’ve handled several of these cases.

Because trade secret cases are a particularized area of intellectual property law, attorneys who deal with trade secrets must be familiar with the procedural and substantive nuances of misappropriation claims. As an example, it is crucial to any misappropriation claim that the plaintiff, at an initial stage of the lawsuit, identifies the information claimed to have been misappropriated with reasonable particularity.

Prenuptial And Postnuptial Agreement Lawyer

Why Get A Prenup?

The idea of a prenuptial agreement rubs quite a few people the wrong way. “Why get married if you anticipate a potential failure?” they may ask. They may fear that a prenup will become a self-fulfilling prophecy of marital breakdown. Judgments such as these tend to overlook several realities that engaged people should face head-on as they prepare to marry:

About half the marriages in our society end in divorce. Entertaining the notion of a possible divorce someday can be realistic and even prudent.
Many people preparing to marry have financial and family complications to take into consideration: inherited assets, business interests, wide income differentials between spouses or children from previous marriages.
Divorce litigation dealing with division of assets can be very costly.
A prenuptial agreement can serve as a sort of “insurance policy” against potentially nasty legal maneuvers in the event of a marital breakup.

Who Needs A Prenup?

At our law firm, we often see clients who are considering prenuptial agreements falling into one of two categories:

Young people who have special financial circumstances such as gifting by older generations
Older people who have worked their whole lives and have substantial assets

Rest assured that if we help you craft a prenuptial agreement, we will do so fully hoping and expecting that you will never have to use it. On the other hand, we can predict from experience that you and your fiancé or fiancée will find peace of mind in putting down in writing the expectations that you both bring into the marriage with regard to each other’s assets.

Postnuptial agreements, on the other hand, have several common applications; namely:

As tools of reconciliation
As a way to keep business interests of spouses separate
As a way of spelling out how inheritances will be treated

Parental Rights For Unmarried Couples

In today’s society, it is not uncommon for unmarried people to have children together. When these couples split, there is usually not any sort of court order guiding how important decisions regarding the children will be handled.

Resolving Parenting Issues

Our attorneys have extensive experience establishing parental rights for unmarried couples. We work with our clients to obtain a clear understanding of their objectives, and then take the steps necessary to meet those goals. We help our clients obtain court orders that will cover critical parenting issues, including:

Child custody
Visitation
Child support
Medical decisions
Child care
Health care
Education
Religion

Why Paternity Is Important

In Utah, before custody or any other parental rights are given to a child’s father, paternity must be established. Paternity determines who is the legal father of a child. Many fathers are unaware that having their name on a child’s birth certificate is not enough to establish paternity.

Paternity is important because it not only gives the child’s father legal rights and responsibilities, but it also offers protections for the child. Once paternity is established, a child may be put on his or her father’s health insurance plan and is entitled to receive benefits, such as Social Security or veterans benefits. The child also has inheritance rights in the event that the father passes away.

Paternity is also important for the unmarried mother because it entitles her to receive child support from the child’s father.

Establishing Paternity

Paternity can be established in one of the three ways:

Voluntary Declaration of Paternity (VDP) — This is a legal acknowledgement of paternity that is often signed by the parents along with the birth certificate when the child is born.
Administrative Paternity Order — Paternity can also be established administratively through the Office of Recovery Services if a parent applies for child support and paternity is proven.
Judicial paternity — This is the most powerful way of establishing paternity because it is the form of paternity that enables the ORS to set up or enforce custody or parenting time arrangements with the child. To obtain a judicial order of paternity, either parent or both parents have the right to petition to court, establishing paternity.

As soon as paternity has been established, the unmarried parents will stand in the same position as divorcing couples.

Free Initial Consultation with Lawyer

It’s not a matter of if, it’s a matter of when. Legal problems come to everyone. Whether it’s your son who gets in a car wreck, your uncle who loses his job and needs to file for bankruptcy, your sister’s brother who’s getting divorced, or a grandparent that passes away without a will -all of us have legal issues and questions that arise. So when you have a law question, call Ascent Law for your free consultation (801) 676-5506. We want to help you!