Jonathan Pollard is an employment and competition lawyer based in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Jonathan has extensive experience litigating a wide-range of competition claims, including non-compete, trade secret, trademark, false advertising and antitrust claims. Jonathan also has extensive experience litigating employment disputes, particularly FLSA claims and workplace sexual assault/harassment claims. He has tried both jury and bench trials to verdict and successfully prosecuted appeals in the Eleventh Circuit and Florida state appellate courts. He is licensed in Florida and all federal district courts in Florida.
Jonathan has been quoted on non-compete and trade secret issues in or on the Wall Street Journal, PBS News Hour, NPR, Bloomberg, The Guardian, FundFire, Digital Guardian, and many more. He has been quoted on issues of litigation strategy and trial practice by The Expert Institute. His articles have appeared in numerous publications including Litigation Commentary & Review, Law.com, and Law360. He has taught continuing legal education courses on non-compete and trade secret litigation to other lawyers. He has served as an expert witness in multi-million dollar litigation that relates to his areas of practice.
Non-Compete Litigation
Jonathan and his firm have extensive experience defending employees, executives, and entrepreneurs against non-compete and trade secret claims. Jonathan routinely represents doctors, C-level executives, sales executives, engineers, financial advisors, real estate agents, and other high level employees who are switching companies or who have started their own businesses. Likewise, Jonathan routinely represents companies that are facing litigation over hiring employees who are subject to non-compete agreements. Outside of the employment context, Jonathan routinely represents individuals who have sold their businesses and agreed to certain restrictive covenants but who wish to reenter the market through a new venture. An important note: Jonathan does not prosecute employee non-compete agreements. He does not believe in them. However, this does not extend to sale of a business non-compete agreements. In the sale of a business context, Pollard both prosecutes and defends non-compete claims.
In addition to litigating non-compete matters, Jonathan routinely advises both individuals and corporate entities on a broad range of related issues including employment contracts, employee poaching and raiding, separation agreements, hiring decisions, the purchase or sale of business interests and the execution of commercial leases.
Trade Secret Litigation
Jonathan both prosecutes and defends claims for theft of trade secrets, often in connection with non-compete disputes. He routinely advises companies on potential exposure for theft of trade secrets in connection with hiring decisions, joint ventures, or potential acquisitions. He has developed extensive protocols for mitigating exposure on theft of trade secret claims in the aforementioned contexts.
Antitrust Litigation
Jonathan has extensive experience as an antitrust litigator and has both prosecuted and defended complex antitrust claims, including claims based on patent abuse. He has litigated numerous cases under both the Florida Antitrust Law (which encompasses the relevant sub-chapter governing non-compete agreements and valid restraints of trade) and the federal Sherman Act. Most recently, he served as the plaintiff’s expert witness in a $15 million legal malpractice case arising from an underlying antitrust and unfair competition dispute.
Trademark Litigation
Jonathan and his colleagues routinely litigate cases under the federal Lanham (Trademark) Act. Pollard PLLC focuses is trademark litigation practice on false advertising claims.
Recent decisions include:
- IDMWorks LLC v. Pophaly, 192 F. Supp. 3d 1335 (S.D. Fla. 2016) (denying preliminary injunction in non-compete case)
- West v. LQ Mgmt., LLC, 156 F. Supp. 3d 1361 (S.D. Fla. 2015) (denying summary judgment on 42 USC 1981 hotel discrimination claim)
- Evans v. Generic Solution Engineering, 2015 WL 6554429, (Fla. 5th DCA 2015) (vacating preliminary injunction in non-compete case)
- American Registry, LLC v. Hanaw et al, 2015 WL 5687693, (M.D. Fla. Sept. 25, 2015) (awarding defendants prevailing party attorney’s fees under FDUTPA in trade secret dispute)
- Moon v. Medical Technology Associates, 2015 WL 413347 (M.D. Fla. Jan. 30, 2015) (denying preliminary injunction on remand)
- Moon v. Medical Technology Associates, 577 F. App’x 934 (11th Cir. 2014) (vacating preliminary injunction in non-compete case)
- American Registry Hanaw, 2013 WL 6332971 (M.D. Fla. Dec. 5, 2013) (dismissing trade secret and FDUTPA claims under Twombly)
Substantive areas of interest include:
- Non-compete litigation
- Trade secret litigation
- The intersection of medicine and competition
- Non-compete agreements and antitrust
- Employee poaching and raiding
- False advertising litigation
- Defamation and trade libel
- Choice of law and conflicts of law
Prior to establishing his own practice, Jonathan spent three years at the law firm Boies, Schiller & Flexner where he represented numerous blue chip companies in complex commercial cases. Jonathan earned his B.A. from Cornell University, where he served as the President of the Cornell Speech & Debate Team, earning honors as a national finalist and an All-American. During his time at Cornell, Jonathan was named a College Scholar, awarded a research fellowship through the Andrew Mellon Foundation, and selected as an inaugural member of the Goldman Sachs Global Leaders Program. In his senior year, he was tapped by University leaders to represent Cornell in the Rhodes Scholar competition.
Jonathan earned his J.D. from Georgetown University, where he was awarded a Law Center Scholarship, served as an associate editor of the Georgetown Law Journal, and participated in the school’s asylum clinic. Throughout law school, Mr. Pollard served as a contributing writer for a number of legal publications, including The Hedge Fund Law Report and the Native American Report.
Prior to law school, Jonathan taught high school English in southwest Baltimore, Maryland.
Contact Info:
954-332-2380
jpollard@pollardllc.com
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