The Biden administration’s Department of Justice (DOJ) Antitrust Division recently secured its first criminal conviction for a labor-side violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Act after VDA OC LLC (VDA) entered a guilty plea. The conviction follows a pair of highly publicized losses the DOJ suffered earlier this year in its first two criminal trials involving no-poach and wage-fixing accusations. While VDA’s guilty plea shows the DOJ’s commitment to criminally prosecuting labor-side Section 1 claims, questions still remain about the DOJ’s ability to convince juries — and the public — that businesses should not communicate with each other about employee pay or the solicitation of other businesses’ employees.
U.S.A. v. Ryan Hee and VDA OC LLC, formerly Advantage On Call LLC
On March 30, 2021, the DOJ filed an indictment against Ryan Hee and VDA OC LLC, formerly known as Advantage on Call LLC, alleging that the defendants had violated 15 U.S.C. § 1 conspiracy in restraint of trade.[1]
VDA is a contract health care staffing service that operates in multiple states and provides health care personnel, including nurses, to the entities with which it contracts.[2] For many years, including the years relevant to the prosecution, Mr. Hee served as the regional manager of VDA’s Las Vegas office.[3] Per the indictment, VDA, at the direction of Mr. Hee, entered into a conspiracy with an unnamed competitor to refrain from recruiting or hiring each other’s nurses and not to compete with...
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