Wyko employees charged with stealing Goodyear's OTR technology

ERJ staff report (DS)

Washington DC -- The US Department of Justice has said two engineers with Wyko Tire Technology Inc. have been charged with conspiring to steal trade secrets from the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company and scheming to defraud Goodyear of confidential and proprietary information.

Clark Alan Roberts, 46, and Sean Edward Howley, 38, were arrested on Friday morning and arraigned before US Magistrate Judge Clifford Shirley.

According to the indictment, returned on March 3, 2009, Wyko secured a contract in early 2007 with the Haohau South China Guilin Rubber Company Limited (HHSC), a Chinese tyre manufacturing company located in Guilin, Peoples Republic of China, to supply tyre manufacturing equipment for use in producing large "off the road" (OTR) tyres.

The DoJ alleges that in late May 2007, Roberts and Howley traveled to Goodyear's Topeka, Kansas tyre factory. After allegedly misrepresenting the reasons for their visit, the defendants used a cell phone to surreptitiously photograph proprietary OTR tyre manufacturing equipment. According to the indictment, the defendants later emailed the unauthorised photographs, which contained valuable trade secret information, to employees at Wyko's UK offices in Dudley, UK, who then used the photographs to complete a similar piece of tyre manufacturing machinery for the HHSC contract.

The indictment charges one count of conspiracy to commit theft of trade secrets, seven counts of theft of trade secrets, three counts of wire fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. If convicted of all charges, the defendants each face a maximum of 150 years in prison and $2.75 million in fines.

An indictment is merely a formal charge by the grand jury. Each defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty in a court of law.

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Press release from US Department of Justice

Goodyear called FBI over tire secrets; two charged CBS47 (US - Tennessee)

Pair accused of plotting to steal tire secrets at Topeka plant Kansas City Star (US - Tennessee)

Two East Tennesseans charged with stealing Goodyear secrets VolunteerTV (Tennessee)