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Comment by derekp7 | Hacker News Reader

Something I don't understand -- a non compete is between an individual and their (previous) employer. The new company hiring the employee has NO contractual or legal obligations to the former employer -- so why the tendency towards firing? And if the former employer contacted the new one, making legal threats in order to get a person fired, isn't that itself illegal? (Wrongful interference with Employment Relationship).

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> Something I don't understand -- a non compete is between an individual and their (previous) employer. The new company hiring the employee has NO contractual or legal obligations to the former employer

Well, this part is wrong. Once they become aware of the contract, they risk the potential of liability for tortious interference. [0]

> And if the former employer contacted the new one, making legal threats in order to get a person fired, isn't that itself illegal?

So long as there was no misrepresentation involved, I don't see how it would be illegal. What law do you think would be broken?

[0] https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/intentional_interference_wit...

I am not a lawyer but I believe this is because there is a tort for inducing someone to break their contract with a third party. Therefore as the new employer they'd be on the hook.

Even when the new employer has not been sued, there are cases where they have paid the previous employer to settle the non-compete, as was the case with a CEO Nortel hired from Motorola:

"The two companies were involved in a brief legal dispute last year after Nortel announced it had chosen Motorola's former chief operating officer, Mike Zafirovski, as its next CEO. Citing non-compete agreements, Motorola sued Zafirovski in October. The dispute was settled a few days later when Nortel agreed to pay $11.5 million to end the matter.

Under the terms of that October settlement, Zafirovski and Nortel agreed not to recruit Motorola employees."

(Not trying to say this case is anything like that of a much lower-level journalist as described in the article. That seems unfair and harsh)

http://www.infoworld.com/article/2674269/networking/nortel-a...

I guess in this particular case, journalism, the reporter cannot work on any article or subject anymore. Almost all old cases and even related cases are probably covered by the old employer's magazines etc.

If you're a programmer, it means that you cannot work for a certain client, or even in a certain branch, but this case is so much broader.

I suspect there's a problem with them getting "information" from an employee "illegally". That's very vague, but that may not be a helpful thing if a competitor is trying to root through your data to confirm or deny whether you've profited from trade secrets of theirs...

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