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Witness says anger led worker to sell Coca-Cola trade secrets
By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published January 23, 2007
ATLANTA - A former secretary at the Coca-Cola Co. was angry at her employer for not treating her well and hatched a plan to steal trade secrets from the beverage giant to sell them to rival PepsiCo Inc., a co-defendant testified Monday at the woman's conspiracy trial. Edmund Duhaney, who pleaded guilty in the case and agreed to testify, told jurors that Joya Williams said the documents and product samples - which include information about the company's new coffee-infused drink Coca-Cola Blak - could be worth a lot of money to a competitor. "She made a statement, 'This happens all the time in corporate America' - that Pepsi, the rival company, would be interested in this," Duhaney said, recalling an April 2006 meeting with Williams and another co-defendant, Ibrahim Dimson. Duhaney also testified that Williams was angry at the world's largest beveragemaker. "She felt she wasn't being treated right at her job," Duhaney said. Duhaney said Williams told him she had been planning the scheme for some time, copying confidential documents little by little. "She just let me know this was something she had been planning, taking a little at a time, amassing over a period of time," Duhaney testified. Williams faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted of the single federal conspiracy charge against her. She has pleaded not guilty. Williams remains free on bond pending the outcome of the trial. Duhaney and Dimson have pleaded guilty and are awaiting sentencing. Williams, Duhaney and Dimson were indicted in July, accused of stealing new product samples and confidential documents from the Coca-Cola Co. and trying to sell them to PepsiCo Inc. The alleged conspiracy was foiled after Pepsi warned Atlanta-based Coca-Cola, and an undercover FBI investigation was launched. Williams was fired from her job as an administrative assistant to Coca-Cola's global brand director after the allegations came to light.
[Last modified January 23, 2007, 00:00:45]
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