## Facts

- Porters Building Centers, Inc. (Porters) operated building-supply and lumber stores in Missouri and Kansas.
- Sprint Lumber, Inc. (Sprint Lumber) competed with Porters, and several Porters employees left Porters to work for Sprint Lumber, leading to a broader business dispute and lawsuit.
- Jerry Downey, a former Porters employee, was named as a defendant in Porters’ suit tied to the employee departures and related competitive conduct.
- In the same federal action, Downey asserted counterclaims against Porters based on alleged conduct by Porters personnel after the employment relationship ended.
- One counterclaim alleged trespass to chattels: Downey claimed Porters employees used a Porters computer to access Downey’s personal Gmail account and view emails without authorization.
- Porters moved for summary judgment on the trespass-to-chattels counterclaim, arguing that emails (and an email account) are not “chattel” and that the claim failed as a matter of law.

## Issues

1. Under Missouri law, can emails or a personal web-based email account constitute a “chattel” that is capable of being trespassed upon for purposes of the tort of trespass to chattels?
2. If emails are not chattel, can a trespass-to-chattels claim survive summary judgment where the alleged interference is unauthorized access to information rather than dispossession of, or damage to, tangible personal property?

## Decision

- The court granted Porters’ motion for summary judgment on Downey’s trespass-to-chattels counterclaim.
- The court concluded that the alleged object of interference—emails and/or the email account—did not qualify as “chattel” within the meaning of the common-law tort as applied under Missouri law.
- The court further found Downey had not shown the kind of dispossession, deprivation of use, or impairment to the condition, quality, or value of tangible property required to support trespass to chattels.
- The trespass-to-chattels counterclaim was dismissed; other counterclaims and claims in the larger case were addressed separately within the ongoing litigation.

## Legal Principles

- Trespass to chattels protects possessory interests in personal property and requires intentional interference that results in dispossession, deprivation of use for an actionable time, or impairment of the chattel’s condition, quality, or value.
- The tort is directed at interference with tangible personal property; intangible communications or data, standing alone, do not fit the traditional “chattel” requirement.
- Where the complained-of harm is the viewing or obtaining of electronic communications (as opposed to damage to, or loss of use of, a physical device), the claim generally sounds in other legal theories rather than trespass to chattels.

## Conclusion

In *Porters Building Centers, Inc. v. Sprint Lumber*, the court resolved a narrow counterclaim at summary judgment, holding that alleged unauthorized access to a former employee’s personal Gmail and emails did not support trespass-to-chattels liability because the claim targeted intangible communications and lacked the required interference with tangible personal property.


Porters Building Centers, Inc. v. Sprint Lumber, 2017 WL 4413288 (2017)