Beware the Ides of March. This saying, made famous by William Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar, was a warming to Caesar that he was about to be stabbed (33 times!) and by a man he considered a friend. Today my friends, is the Ides of March.
A dismissed employee of IntegraClick, ClickBooth parent company, Robert McAfee, who functioned as the Vice President of Technology has filed a lawsuit, claiming that he was fired for refusing to destroy evidence that could be used in a potential regulatory investigation by the FTC. The lawsuit, filed in Florida, claims that ClickBooth violated Florida whistle-blower laws, and that because of this he should receive money from the company. Copy of the entire lawsuit can be found below the article
IntegraClick however is not taking these accusations lying down, and has told Performance Marketing Insider that they are without any merit whatsoever, and that these accusations came only after they failed to pay off the dismissed employee a “separation” fee that he requested. IntegraClick claims McAfee has made these same allegations before about a previous employer. It is their story that this lawsuit was filed after the employee had already left the organization, and the claims were only made now when the employee realized he wasn’t going to get money from IntegraClick for his termination.
They stand by the fact that the employee was fired only after a poor performance review, and was not in fact involved at all with any legal or compliance discussions as he was in the technical department. .
What is very interesting that it is lacking any mention of McAfee speaking to any law enforcement or regulatory agency about his findings. Most Whistle-blower lawsuits usually have that aspect that the person involved actually blew the “whistle” on the company’s bad actions, and because of this they were fired. One can assume that since it is not mentioned, that McAfee did not in fact speak to anyone about this.
In Florida however, this is not a requirement and a whistle-blower type lawsuit can be brought just on the claim that the employee was asked to do something potentially illegal and fired for that act. However, that employee would have to prove that this was the main reason or a major contributory reason that he was fired, not for any other reason. This is basically a he-said, she-said type of lawsuit.
According to their representative, IntegraClick has already hired an independent 3rd party (BDO) to audit their data and have told us that the auditors have already verified that IntegraClick’s statement of events is correct.
Obviously with the concern about FTC investigations, this comes at a bad time. ClickBooth, like many companies are most likely looking at their past actions and their affiliate’s actions, to ensure that they are fully compliant. Almost every company in the industry has received information notices from the FTC, asking questions about their businesses and their affiliate’s method of promotions.
ClickBooth, the #2 rated network on Performance Marketing Insiders, Top 10 Network list has been blowing up of late with its traffic and US reach doubling over the past three months.
Source: Quantcast.com – http://www.quantcast.com/clickbooth.com .
*Correction made, to spell McAfee not MacCafee
Copy of Lawsuit Below
