Yes, onetime McAfee general counsel Kent Roberts was acquitted for his role in a backdating scandal at his former company. But that doesn’t mean he should be able to sue McAfee for defamation, invasion of privacy and malicious prosecution.
At least that’s the argument that McAfee’s lawyers at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe are making in a motion requesting that Roberts’ suit be deemed meritless under California’s anti-SLAPP law. In the former GC’s complaint, which we told you about last month, Roberts alleged that McAfee and its outside lawyers at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati and Howrey set him up as the fall guy in McAfee’s backdating scandal. (Roberts was fired by the company in 2006, indicted in 2007, acquitted on mail fraud charges in 2008, and eventually cleared of all charges, including those brought by the Securities and Exchange Commission.)
