Walter E. Judge Jr.

Walter Judge practices law in Vermont, Massachusetts, and Maine where he represents businesses in commercial litigation and intellectual property litigation (copyright, trademark, trade secrets, computer and Internet). He also represents retail establishments (both insured and self-insured) in liability claims, having handled dozens of these cases in the last decade. He has won defendant's in three retailer premises liability cases in the last four years.

He also defends a large trucking company with claims in several states and obtained a defendant's verdict in a trucking liability case in 2011. In his product liability practice, he has defended manufacturers of automobiles, food products, toy and recreation equipment, construction materials and consumer goods. Walter also represents businesses in consumer fraud claims brought by the state and private parties. He has conducted trials and appeals in both state and federal courts, as well as mediations and arbitrations.

In October 2008, Walter obtained a defendant's verdict for his client, a supermarket, in a slip and fall case. An elderly woman slipped and fell inside the store and broke her shoulder. The jury delivered a verdict in Walter's client's favor less than 15 minutes after retiring to deliberate. In January 2009, Walter obtained another defendant's verdict for a supermarket. On a damp day in the middle of summer in 2006, the elderly plaintiff wearing wet shoes slipped in the vestibule of the store and broke her hip. The jury deliberated for just under four hours before returning a verdict for Walter's client. Again, in January 2010, Walter obtained a defendant’s verdict for a supermarket. In this case, a customer tripped over a box of produce waiting to be stocked, under a display stand. The jury agreed that the customer was more comparatively negligent than the store. In February 2011, Walter obtained a defendant's verdict for a trash hauling company in a case in which someone was injured by one of their trucks.

In 1994, Walter, working with senior litigation partner Robert Rachlin, went to federal court and obtained the largest verdict in Vermont Federal Court history for his client, a small Vermont software design company, against a large California-based software maker that had hired away his client’s chief software designer and incorporated the client’s software trade secrets into a competing product. More recently, Walter went to federal court and stopped a client’s former employee and that former employee’s new employer, a European-based competitor of Walter’s client, from using the client’s trade secrets. The lawsuit resulted in damages paid to Walter’s client, as well as an injunction against the employee from competing and against the competitor from releasing competing products. Walter has worked on numerous other matters defending his clients’ intellectual property rights against infringement.

Walter is adjunct professor at Vermont Law School, where he teaches the trade secrets section in an introduction to intellectual property course. In addition, he chairs the Vermont Bar Association Insurance Law Committee and was a co-presenter on the topic of "Recent Developments in Vermont Tort, Insurance and Worker's Compensation Law" at the 130th, 131st and 132nd VBA Annual Meetings held in September 2008 - 2010.

Walter frequently lectures on the topic of Trade Secrets Misappropriation and recently presented a program on that subject at the VBA Mid-Year Meeting in March 2012.

Walter was elected by his peers in the Vermont Bar Association to serve a second two-year term on the Vermont Judicial Nominating Board. The Board - which includes attorneys elected by the Bar, members of the public appointed by the governor and members of the legislature appointed by the House and Senate leadership - screens, reviews and nominates candidates to fill judicial vacancies in the state.

Walter also serves as an advisory member of the Tri-State Defense Lawyers Association, a professional organization for defense counsel practicing in Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine, and an affiliate organization of the Defense Research Institute (DRI), whose membership includes more than 20,000 attorneys committed to the defense of civil litigation claims. Walter is a past Vermont representative to DRI.

Based on in-depth interviews with clients and peers, Chambers USA 2012: America's Leading Lawyers for Business selected Walter for recognition as one of Vermont's leading lawyers in the area of general commercial litigation. He is also recognized in Super Lawyers 2010-2012 for his work in the areas of intellectual property litigation, civil litigation defense and personal injury defense: general. In addition, he was selected for membership in the International Association of Defense Counsel.  Established in 1920, the IADC serves approximately 2500 invitation-only, peer-reviewed member attorneys with advanced skills and practice representing corporations and insurers in defense law.

Walter is a 1997 graduate of the Leadership Champlain program, a training and development program for future community leaders in Vermont. He is on the board of the Vermont Alliance for Arts Education, a non-profit advocacy group that promotes the teaching of the arts in Vermont schools and the continuing education of art teachers, and the Concord Academy (Mass.) Alumni Council. Active in local affairs in his town of Charlotte, Vermont, Walter is also an officer of his neighborhood association.

Publications
Walter is one of three primary author’s of DRM’s recently launched blog, The IP Stone: Deciphering Intellectual Property Law for Business. Walter's posts include:

Breaking Up Is Hard To Do: Protecting Your Company When High-Level Employees Depart, April 1, 2012

Loose Lips Sink More Than Ships: So, How Much “Secrecy” Is Required To Protect Trade Secrets?, February 20, 2012

Protecting Trade Secrets | Eight Questions Businesses Need to Ask and Answer, January 12, 2012


Walter has authored numerous articles, papers and book chapters, including:

Co-author, History Sniffing: Updates On Current Litigation, Bloomberg Law Reports, November 14, 2011

Vermont Superior Court Decides A Number Of Issues Of First Impression In Vermont Insurance And Practice Law, Tri-State Defense Lawyers Association Newsletter, Summer 2011

Co-author, History Sniffing, Bloomberg Law Reports, March 7, 2011

Year in Review (2009) – Developments in Insurance Law, May 2010

Contributing Editor, Employee Duty of Loyalty, A State-By-State Survey, BNA/ABA Section of Labor and Employment Law, Fourth Edition, 2009 & Supplement, 2010

Contributing Editor, Tortious Interference in the Employment Context: A State-by-State Survey, BNA Books/ABA Section on Labor and Employment Law, Third Edition, 2010

Contributing Editor, Covenants Not to Compete, A State-By-State Survey, BNA/ABA Section of Labor and Employment Law, Seventh Edition, 2010

Contributing Editor, Trade Secrets, A State-By-State Survey, BNA/ABA Section of Labor and Employment Law, Third Edition, 2008 & Supplement, 2010

Contributor, Trade Secrets: A State-by-State Compendium, Defense Research Institute, 2008

Contributor, Non-Compete Agreements: A State-by-State Compendium, Defense Research Institute, 2008

Contributor, State Trademark and Unfair Competition Law, Release #40, International Trademark Association, 2008

Contributor, Products Liability: The Duty to Warn: A State-by-State Compendium, Defense Research Institute, 2007

Contributor, Lex Mundi Intellectual Property World Desk Reference (Kluwer)

Contributor, Products Liability Law: A State-by-State Compendium, Defense Research Institute, 2004

Intellectual Property Editor, The Business Suit (commercial litigation journal of the Defense Research Institute)

Co-Author, The Economic Loss Rule, For The Defense, Defense Research Institute, March 2003 

Presentations
Trade Secrets, Vermont Bar Association Mid-Year Meeting, March 2012

Protecting Technology: Patent and Trade Secret Basics, North Country Chamber of Commerce, Plattsburgh, N.Y., January 2012

Trade Secrets: How to Protect Your Valuable Commercial Information, DRM Briefly Speaking Intellectual Property Law Seminar Series, April 2011

Underwood v. Risman, 414 Mass. 96, 605 N.E.2d 832 (Mass. 1993) (lead paint/landlord-tenant/consumer protection)

Vermont Microsystems, Inc. v. Autodesk, Inc., 88 F.3d 142 (2d Cir. 1996) (trade secrets/computer software)

White v. Quechee Lakes Landowners Association, Inc., 170 Vt. 25, 742 A.2d 734 (Vermont 1999) (indemnification/product liability)

McKinnon v. F.H. Morgan & Co., Inc., 170 Vt. 422, 750 A.2d 1026 (Vermont 2000) (choice-of-law/product liability)

Smith & Croyle, LLC v. Ridgewood Power Corporation, 111 F.Supp.2d 77 (D. Mass. 2000) (contract/fraud/consumer protection)

Macia v. Microsoft Corporation, et al., 152 F.Supp.2d 535 (D. Vt. 2001) (trademark infringement)

German