Call Hung Up on Justice

Astute readers may remember a recent Whisper about a defunct financial arrangement between VeriSource Inc. of Rogers and the now out-of-business Advanced Control Solutions Inc. of Bentonville. That agreement was announced in 2004.

Chris Maddox, CEO of VeriSource, had told the Business Journal that one of the reasons the arrangement fell through was because Jeff Call, president of ACS, had been “distracted.”

It seems those distractions were a couple of lawsuits against former ACS employees and clients.

One suit filed by ACS in Benton County is against Orin Justice of Lowell and Advance Environmental Recycling Technologies Inc. of Springdale. Out of multi-thousand page filings, it seems Call believes that Justice, a former ACS employee, was hired away by AERT, a former ACS client. The suit involves breach of employment contract and trade-secret infringement language and seeks unspecified damages.

We’ve heard there’s a similar suit filed in Washington County against another former ACS employee.

Call, who was finally tracked down at an Iowa phone number, declined to comment on the suits.

The Benton County suit is scheduled for court on Feb. 27.