Opinion ID: 696583
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Use of the Word Same in the Unfair-Trade Charge

Text: 20 In North Carolina, an unfair-trade-practice claim under N.C.Gen.Stat. Sec. 75-1.1 requires proof of three elements: (1) an unfair or deceptive act or practice, or an unfair method of competition, (2) in or affecting commerce, (3) proximately causing actual injury to [plaintiff] or [plaintiff's] business. Drouillard v. Keister Williams Newspaper Serv., Inc., 108 N.C.App. 169, 423 S.E.2d 324, 326 (1992), cert. denied, 333 N.C. 344, 427 S.E.2d 617 (1993). Under this standard, it is for the jury to find the facts, after which the court determines as a matter of law whether defendants' conduct as found by the jury violates section 75-1.1. See, e.g., Medina v. Town & Country Ford, Inc., 85 N.C.App. 650, 355 S.E.2d 831 (1987), aff'd per curiam, 321 N.C. 591, 364 S.E.2d 140 (1988). 21 In the instant case, the court by the verdict form asked the jury whether defendants had used information, techniques, processes and ideas that belonged to AG Systems to manufacture and sell the same chromed plastic products that AG Systems sells. (emphasis added). AG Systems objected to this interrogatory and the instructions regarding it. The magistrate overruled the objections and the jury ultimately answered the interrogatory in the negative, thus finding that defendants committed no unfair trade practices. 22 AG Systems argues on appeal that under the North Carolina unfair-trade-practices statute, which has been described as prohibiting any conduct that a court of equity would find unfair, see Harrington Mfg. Co., Inc. v. Powell Mfg. Co., Inc., 38 N.C.App. 393, 248 S.E.2d 739, 744 (1978), cert. denied, 296 N.C. 411, 251 S.E.2d 469 (1979), it is not necessary that the defendant's product be the same as the embodiment of plaintiff's trade secrets; it is sufficient, the argument goes, that the two be very similar, and that the defendant have used the plaintiff's trade secrets to make its product. AG Systems thus claims that the court erred in overruling AG Systems' objection and submitting the interrogatory to the jury using the word same. Again, we disagree. 23 Section 75-1.1 of the North Carolina General Statutes broadly prohibits unfair competition, and thus the question is not merely whether the interrogatory adequately reflects the law, but whether the court's question to the jury adequately encompassed the scope of AG Systems' theory of the case. The question is whether AG Systems' claim was that defendants had made the same product or a similar one. A review of the record makes clear that plaintiff intended to rely on the former theory. Thus, the court did not err because it conformed the interrogatory to the scope of AG Systems' claims against the defendants. 24 On October 5, 1992, approximately one week before the trial began, AG Systems filed with the court a list of proposed jury instructions. Its proposed jury instruction regarding the unfair-trade-practices claim read as follows: 25 Did defendants do one or more of the following: 26 (1) Breach their promise not to manufacture and sell plaintiff's chromed plastic products to anyone else; 27 (2) Use information, techniques, processes and ideas that belonged to AG Systems to manufacture and sell the same chromed plastic products that AG Systems sells? (emphasis added). 28 On October 20, 1992, during trial, fifteen days after AG Systems filed its proposed jury instructions, it objected in open court to the court's adoption of the exact language it had suggested two weeks earlier. Defense counsel pointed out to the court that, [a]s a matter of fact, I think that is what was in the unfair trade practices issue submitted by the plaintiff. AG Systems responded by explaining that, [i]t may well have been and I'm asking in light of what has come out on the stand, to conform that to the evidence. 29 In its opening statement to the jury, AG Systems emphasized that the product being marketed by defendants was, in fact, the same product that [AG Systems] was out there selling.... [AG Systems] called Ron Buck and said you are selling this product to ICI, I had it tested, it's the same product that you are making for me.... In concluding its opening statement, AG Systems reiterated: [W]hen all the evidence has been presented we will have proved to you that this chrome plastic ... is [AG Systems'] trade secret product.... [W]e believe that you will be able to find that it was [AG Systems'] product; that the defendants were wrong to sell it to other people. In her closing argument, AG Systems' counsel again summarized her opening statement, stating that she had told you that we would show you that [AG Systems] had entrusted Ron Buck with a very valuable possession, with [its] new product. And I told you that I would show you that the defendants stole that product and gave it to other people. ... I believe that the evidence we have presented in this courtroom has done exactly what we predicted it would do. (emphasis added). Toward the end of the closing argument, in explaining the court's verdict form to the jury, AG Systems' counsel again stated that, we believe that the evidence is clear that Mr. Buck and Mr. Williams misappropriated this product; they took it and they sold it to ICI. Later, in closing rebuttal, its counsel stated that AG Systems had said to [defendants], you're selling my product to other people, you're breaching our agreement; ... [T]hey knew what they were doing was wrong. They knew they were stealing the product .... (emphasis added). 30 In short, it appears from the record, despite AG Systems' argument to the contrary, that the theory of its unfair-trade-practices claim was that defendants did manufacture or sell the same product that AG Systems sells. We have found nothing significant in the record to support AG Systems' contention that it sought to prove that defendants used AG Systems' trade secrets to produce and sell a similar product.  The overwhelming evidence, gleaned from AG Systems' proposed jury instructions and its opening and closing statements, is that it intended to show that defendants manufactured and sold the same product that AG Systems sells. We are of opinion that the court did not err in so concluding and in retaining the word same in its verdict form.