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"I have found Roy to be forthright and honest. Furthermore, he is an extremely open minded person and well liked person. I cannot believe that Roy will consciously mislead any of his members." Johann Swiegelaar of FelTra (Pty) Ltd
"You are entitled to your own opinions but your are not entitled to your own facts." Andy Titley of GLN in response
THE BACKGROUND TO THE GLN/EGLN DISPUTE Documentation concerning this lawsuit is public record in the following case:
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT DISTRICT OF NEW JERSEY No. 15-cv-05275-AET-DEA Hon. Anne E. Thompson
GLOBAL LOGISTICS NETWORK, INC. a wholly owned subsidiary of GLOBAL LOGISTICS NETWORK, LTD (Plaintiffs)
v
ROYSTON STAPLETON and ELITE GLOBAL LOGISTICS NETWORK, LLC and ELITE GLOBAL NETWORK, LTD
Background
Roy Stapleton (Stapleton) voluntarily resigned as President, Shareholder and Director of GLN on April 30, 2015 and, effective on that date, Andy Titley (Titley) became the sole owner of GLN.
Less than 2 weeks later, Stapleton launched GLN #2 (now known as Elite Global Logistics Network or EGLN). GLN believes Stapleton's conduct in marketing EGLN was done in a manner that violated a Non-Solicitation agreement drafted by Stapleton's attorneys as part of a Separation Agreement and General Release entered into between Stapleton and GLN.
Further research reveals that this was a planned and orchestrated assault on GLN launched over a period of some 6+ months that GLN believes involved a complete breach of fiduciary duties owed by Stapleton to GLN.
The matter now rests in the hands of the federal court in the State of New Jersey.
The Planning and Scheming:
While President, Shareholder and Director of GLN, (and owing a fiduciary duty to GLN), Stapleton planned GLN#2 (EliteGLN) by undertaking the following in preparation:
October 2014: Elite Global Logistics Network, Ltd was incorporated (Attachment #1) (admitted by Stapleton's attorneys) November 2014: Elite Global Logistics Network, LLC was incorporated (Attachment #2) with Stapleton as the sole member and manager (admitted by Stapleton's attorneys) November 2014: The elitegln.com domain name was registered (Attachment #3) (denied by Stapleton's attorneys) December 2014: A graphic designer was employed to create the EGLN Logo (Attachment #4) (admitted by Stapleton's attorneys) April 2015: An attempt to register the trademark of EGLN was made (Attachment #5) (denied by Stapleton's attorneys)
The Separation Agreement:
In mid-April, Stapleton's attorneys advised that Stapleton wanted to resign as of April 30, 2015 and made an offer for Titley to acquire his shares. After numerous discussions between attorneys, a Separation Agreement was agreed upon after much discussion concerning Paragraph 10. Whereas Titley had no objection to Stapleton pursuing any activities that he wanted, Titley's only concern was to protect his investment and the wording agreed upon was "Employee agrees..that for a term of (1) year..he will not..solicit any member of GLN..to sever its relationship with GLN..or entice any current GLN Member to join any other network."
The complete wording is given below with the Yellow highlights written by Stapleton's attorneys.
In reading the above, there can be absolutely no doubt that based on information received, Stapleton was and remains in flagrant breach of this Non-Solicitation Agreement. Further, Titley relied on this paragraph when purchasing the GLN Shares from Stapleton.
The Separation Agreement was signed by Stapleton on April 22, 2015 and effective on April 30, 2015. Titley paid substantial compensation for the transfer of share ownership.
The EGLN Launch:
With the ink hardly dry on the Separation Agreement containing the above Non-Solicitation Convent, in early May 2015, Stapleton launched his "GLN#2 Network" and started soliciting GLN Members to join. On May 18, 2015, Stapleton issued a Press Release and listed 200+ GLN Members on his website - many without their specific approval.
Worthy of note is that Stapleton used his WPA email address (a competing network) of Roy@ourWPA.com for his solicitation efforts. This usage was NOT approved by WPA who advised Titley that "We are / were not aware of this activity of using our email for other than WPA Network business. We also do not encourage any more competing networks, as there are far too many now. We will demand that Roy no longer uses the email address of WPA Network for anything but WPA Network business. We will also ask for copies of his emails to be sent as cc to admin email, to monitor same."
The Hacking & Access To GLN's Proprietary Data:
After his departure, GLN believes that Stapleton accessed the GLN Members Only Area and a total of 3,904 Requests were made. Stapleton is believed to have gained access using the Access Codes of 4 GLN Members. After GLN served its lawsuit on Stapleton no further attempts were made. (See Attachments #6).
Stapleton's attorneys have acknowledged that Stapleton was and is in possession of confidential materials belonging to GLN and voluntarily returned Stapleton's laptop (purchased by GLN) for further analysis. The status of other known materials in Stapleton's possession has yet to be determined.
The Legal Case:
Having consulted with various attorneys and GLN Members, Titley had no other option than to turn this matter over to his attorneys. In the USA, there are 3 steps: a request to the Courts for Emergency Relief, a request to the Courts for Temporary Injunctive Relief and then Trial by Jury.
In advance of the hearing for Emergency Relief, Stapleton's attorneys acknowledged that Stapleton still had confidential GLN materials in his possession and agreed to (i) Abide by the non- solicitation covenenant and not solicit GLN Members, (ii) Turn over the Laptop that was purchased by GLN pending the Hearing for Temporary Relief scheduled for mid-September 2015.
Titley's claims include Breach of Contract, Breach of Fiduciary Duty, Breach of Contract and Fiduciary Duty, Breach of Common-Law Duty of Confidentiality, Fencing of Stolen Property, Tortuous Interference with Prospective Economic Advantage, Breach of Implied Covenant of Good Faith and Fair Dealing, Unfair Competition, Violations of The Lanham Act and New Jersey's Fair Trade Act
Stapleton's counterclaims are for Breach of Contract, Faith and Fair Dealing, Tortuous Interference with a Contractual Relationship, Defamation, Claim for an Accounting and Claim for Declaratory Judgment Concerning the Agreement and General Release.
A Trial Date is expected in mid-2016. Please visit www.eliteGLN.net for additional details.
Attachment (1):
Attachment (2):
Attachment (3): Domain Name Registration:
Attachment (4):
Attachment (5):
Attachment (6):
System Log in go2gln.com showing activity. Note the IP Address (being Freehold, NJ and the Hostname being the same as the origin of email below sent by Stapleton). Also note that the Access Codes of ECX/UK, Dietrich Lojisiks/Turkey, DL Logistics/Netherlands and Affiliated Global Logistics/Canada were used to access the GLN Members Only Area.
HTML Source Code of an email sent by Stapleton showing the same Hostname as the System Log above:
Attachment (7):
Screenshot of Member Listing extracted from EGLN Website.
Note the identical spelling of Company Names and Affiliated Air & Ocean Offices - 100% identical to data on the GLN website
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