Purchase & Sale Legal Rights to contract work files

[JScottDenver]

I have been working as an Architectural Draftsman for a company on a contract basis for 12 years. I was not an employee of the company and I was only given a 1099 one year of the 12 years that I worked for them. The company's owner recently passed away, and the company was sold. The new owners contacted me and asked if I had the CAD drawings on file that I created for the company they just bought. They are claiming legal rights to all of the drawings that I have on file and are insistent on me surrendering 12 years worth of work to them.

I have a question regarding who legally owns those files and whether or not I am legally obligated to give them to the new owners. The company I worked for no longer exists. The new company is running under a new EIN and corporate name. The new company also has not presented me with a new contract to start working for them.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[ElleMD]

Check with an intellectual property attorney but the odds are very much in favor of them being owned by the company which employed you and therefore, now the property of the company which purchased them.

 

[txls]

Did you have a written contract with the original company?

 

[JScottDenver]

The contract part of this agreement is fuzzy at best. What contract I had with the original company never stipulated who owned the drawings. I had a sole-proprietor business that provided drawings for the company, and they paid me. Most of what I did was based on verbal agreements. While I have the original contract that was signed by the now deceased owner of the previous company, it doesn't state anything regarding intellectual property or nondisclosure of the drawings I created for them.

I hope that answers your question.

 

[army judge]

The contract part of this agreement is fuzzy at best. What contract I had with the original company never stipulated who owned the drawings. I had a sole-proprietor business that provided drawings for the company, and they paid me. Most of what I did was based on verbal agreements. While I have the original contract that was signed by the now deceased owner of the previous company, it doesn't state anything regarding intellectual property or nondisclosure of the drawings I created for them.

I hope that answers your question.

It might be best to let this go, give them whatever documents you can find. The documents won't do you or them any good. But, if they tell the IRS about the allegedly unreported and untaxed income you received, with only one "1099" in 12 years, things won't end well for you.

If I were you, I'd slow my roll, be quiet as mouse, otherwise the cat's going to come sniffing around for you! Pls, in your state, the cat's little buddy the Colorado "kitty" is going to want to play, too.

 

[txls]

If the contract is fuzzy then a court ruling would most likely be in line with whatever is common practice in the industry. (I'm not a lawyer, but in my line of work I've often encountered this advice to make decisions based on what is common practice in the industry) Consider what it would cost you to defend, and what you stand to gain(or lose) by refusing.