docket simply saying that they are duplicative of the breach of contract claim and referred to the record where they know they are not on or as mr know the alleged a contract claim he did his contract claim was that he was an independent contractor for both x and titties and he had a clarifying document and that him and it was his claim entitle him to keep his clients the breach of contract claim and there were two one was unfair business practices and the other was tortious interference with perspective economic relations so under the contract even if i accept could have competed and that was the issue that the lower court said was to go to the jury i had to do so properly we cite super usa vs samsung which holds where the facts constituting the breach of contract also constitute a breach of an independent legal duty as a separate a separate claim for tour will lie and the duty was not to interfere with the contract the independent duty was not to compete unfairly and not to interfere with the contracts the prospective economic contract with people who had been mr novak's clients for years  right emanates from the contract they do not emanate from the contract they are independent torts now if we look at what was alleged in the complaint to support not your ordinary letter that says your broker laughed let me introduce you to a new person it had that language but it also had the eggs from the executive vice president who wrote i ask you call me immediately if you were contacted by any person suggesting that you transfer the investment account you have with us there can be disadvantages to transferring your account him and they had thirty days to do so and what else did they do they sent representatives to visit his clients visiting one client at seven am they made disparaging remarks about him they became aggressive with his clients indeed one client said in an affidavit that they threatened to terminate a long term friendship if the client went and took his business with novak after he left ensured mr novak's clients were intimidated they made the access representatives made them question mr novak's integrity they said that question his ethics they said that question his character and his morals if you are entitled to compete under a contract and that was what was to go to the jury you need proprietary interest in his clients therefore if they went out and trade them yes it could fall under the rubric of the breach of contract but that did not make it exclusively a breach of contract cla when these other acts were alleged they gave rise to the tour of unfair competition there was also another tour alleged which was with perspective economic advantage and two of pledge that or there were four elements the existing business relationship between mr novak and third parties here i don't think that was really at issue everybody knows that mr novak had these relationships with these clients and that's why he was hired by x or specifically for these relationships the next is that the defendants knew of the relationships i think that's pretty use or used unfair dishonest or improper means intimidating clients talking about ethical breaches  miller from x telling me that steven know that he had violated ethical regulations that he might go to jail and that my account might be in danger if i kept it with him and that i should transfer it immediately to him and the other people of access there was also injury to the relationship at the pleading stay mr novak identified at least one client who left him because of x is actions the tour because as super says the same exact facts could be a breach of contract and a tour at the same time and if we look at the law in this jurisdiction the tour of unfair competition has indeed been described as a patient tour one that includes various forms of court during the trial and what the trial court permitted in fact the evidence around the supposed misdeeds so i think is grossly misstated and does not state elements of the tort claims that were properly dismissed nonetheless the evidence that came in before the jury related to what the supposed misdeeds were the judge in the instructions to the verdict form in question three has plenty of proven by a preponderance of the evidence that acts improperly interfered with the rights of customers to choose to do further business with no note the judge didn't say did x only interfere with contract rights so did they improperly interfere and in an awkward fifteen minutes after a ten plus day trial the jury came back and answer all three of those questions that there was nothing improper that was done here you deny that the rights of the tour rights emanate from a separate contract and the employment argued i completely agree that the rights did come from the clarifying documents from the contractual agreements absolutely that's where the rights came from and thus were properly resolved by the judge because of the fact that that was the emanation of the rights that were in question here there was no dispute about that what counsel talks about is a theoretical situation where you might have something entirely separate that does not apply in this case in a different case perhaps but not on the facts in this case your honor it does not make any difference the second contract that prohibited the tortious interference porsches interference there is nothing here that was tortious in any event  whether you call of the rights arising out of the contract or human is even if the tort claims were not dismissed the jury's verdict would have shown that they would've he would have lost that's two parts yes absolutely your honor that the jury verdict because of the very speedy because we have lots of the specifics here of what the jury was questioned about and the question the jury answered and it was the broader the issue of was there improper interference those are the words did defense to these do the tort claims if their work toward claims they had the right to go after the business just as no victim they have the right to go after the business that had been serviced these were no thanks preexisting kleiner they may or may not have been your daughter in some cases perhaps in some cases not but in any event when he came and took the benefit of his deal with x the documents that were executed stated what the rights were the clarifying document and the rights were that and the rights generally under the law is there is no exclusive nature here the r v both parties had the right as they did he was out in the marketplace competing within weeks within two weeks for the services to continue the services for those clients axa has the right to continue to serve those who it had been serving individuals the finner rights make finra regs make it quite clear of course that clients have the rights to go where they want the decision was the client's but both parties have the fair right to compete for those for their continued business so that was his list of clients that he brought to the deal they didn't remain is property no you are not under the agreements in question they were not his property if anything with fines were business deal and i think councils taken some liberties with what's actually in the record with regard to this but they clearly and there is the issue of the fact that he was violating both actual rules and federal rules with regard to the activity of selling away that's why his agreements were terminated after an investigation by the national compliance office it was found to have been engaged in the selling away activities that exact is is violative of rules and i think is not appropriate conduct so to the extent that they were making clear to clients and it is also accurate if you move these kinds of products you may be paying excess fees and losing benefits when you move these kinds of products and so it was a perfectly appropriate and fair to you need to look carefully at the entire picture before you make a move you know the words it was true oh yes you're out of it that it is true to say that there may be disadvantages to shifting the business absolutely right i have a separate qu you with these the attorney's fees that you saw here and that were word it seems to me who looking at this record that at least with regard to some of them you were you were getting fees for work done on the issues unrelated to the notes and that's that's a problem it seems to me there's a motion for summary judgment that you filed that contained motion for summary judgment on the notes but the way that mr novak pursued that case during those nine years was to intertwine what was doing owing on the notes that he had signed as well as his claims and said that they were related and indeed he was seeking offsets t notes based on his arguments judge hellerstein presided over this for nine years and was in the position to know based on that nine year history what work had been done and what work was required to be done under the arkan stance because of the intertwining you just took the turkey requested just rather i don't think his order makes it pretty clear that he did follow the appropriate standards and this is an area where the judge has extra discretion if anything what he knew about nine years of this case and therefore what was justified in fact with regard to there were some the judgment motions with regard only to the fees issues as well as the broader an overall issues it seems to me that the  think your honor if the work on the notes would be discreet if you will but in the context of this case and the way mr nova chose to litigate this case it was anything but discrete that's that's the reason why i think it's entirely appropriate for what in fact was the order with regard to the awarding fees the judge hellerstein entered in this case based on his knowledge of the fact of that intertwining throughout the case of the theories that were brought where a substantial amount of work say maybe not based on the notes were but ought to be compensated your honor among other things he was seeking accounting which he thought related to  what would be due and owing on the notes his approach on the issue of what his compensation he argued remember in this case strenuously rejected by the jury promptly that he was not properly compensated his argument around his compensation he would have said would reduce if he had been properly compensated his argument was that would have reduced what was still do when i'm going on the note those are two examples your honor of how they were intertwined of the tree auction has nothing to do with the notes no you  e but and and so that that that that would would be rather easily separated out and also it seems to me that you know the the answer that was that you you filed apparently one of the attorneys who worked on this list of the work as drafted answer but the other work but but but later on listed her her work is draft answer and counterclaims implying that  that's they're different and the answer probably included the counterclaims as part of that part of the filing but so that's you know there's does seem to be some ways in which one could go through this and pull out the ones that are plainly plai there was billing discretion with regard to what was originally requested hearing the judge was aware of the fact that there were significant reductions from what might have been indeed there was a very good argument that we could have that we could have asked for more because of the intertwining of the to point something out there is some interconnection but that and connection goes to the mr novak had complained about compensation all the time because it was his understanding that he was to be compensated in one way his agreements are silent as to how he's supposed to be compensated it says various schedules in one case that may be and in the other case various schedules that can change time to time and what i do want to point out on this on this issue of being interrelated they are one of the notes says exactly what mr novak was claiming that summary judgment motion judge hellerstein identified three issues that were still in the case and of course that guided trial counsel as to how and what he could preserve and develop in the case and the third issue was did defendants violate any express or implied agreement with plaintiffs his book of business and so judge hellerstein clearly tied that issue to let's look at the contract and let's see what the contracts say and that precluded trial counsel from developing more fully the unfair competition claim as well as the tortious interference so we can't look to watch judge hellerstein charged to the jury indeed counsel never knew that until the day before the case went to the jury and say oh well they considered that they could not have considered it because they couldn't have the evidence thank you you thank