Specialty insurer Argo Group International Holdings has filed a lawsuit against a rival company and two former executives, accusing them of orchestrating a scheme to poach employees from its surety business unit.
The lawsuit, filed in state District Court in San Antonio, Texas, alleges that the defendants conspired to appropriate the Argo Surety business unit to establish a competing venture at DUAL North America.
The defendants “conspired in the shadows” to solicit employees and obtain confidential information, Argo said in its complaint.
The Bermuda-based insurer is seeking an injunction to prevent the defendants from interfering with the contractual obligations of the departed employees or utilizing the confidential information they reportedly possess. It is also pursuing unspecified compensatory and punitive damages.
The key figures named in the lawsuit are Mark Farina and Brendan Keating, who jointly led Argo’s surety unit from November 2021. Farina served as the unit’s global chief underwriting officer, while Keating held the position of chief operating officer. Both were among the 24 employees who resigned to join DUAL.
According to the lawsuit, Farina and Keating violated their contracts by actively soliciting Argo employees to join DUAL, as well as misappropriating “highly confidential information” that included lists of Argo’s largest brokers, account records, and detailed customer data.
Argo also alleges that DUAL and the two executives collaborated with London-based recruiting firm Hanover Search Group to approach nearly every underwriting employee of Argo Surety.
Furthermore, two other former Argo Surety employees were named as defendants. M. Neal Lee, vice president of strategic operations, and Stephen Parnas, vice president and national underwriting officer for contract surety, were accused of participating in a civil conspiracy and breaching their contracts by disclosing Argo’s confidential information.
DUAL, which is part of London-based Howden Group Holdings, has not yet filed an answer to the complaint, according to the San Antonio Express News.
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