Judge Throws Out RIA’s Poaching Suit Against Cambridge

A Virginia federal judge on Monday dismissed a complaint that a registered investment advisor filed against broker-dealer Cambridge Investment Research, according to court documents.

Midlothian, Virginia-based RIA Colonial River Wealth Advisors sued Cambridge in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia in Richmond, on Nov. 10, 2022, alleging the BD assisted advisor Jayne W. Di Vincenzo, also named as a defendant in the suit, in poaching her clients back from Colonial River after she sold the business.

The plaintiff had sought at least $8 million in damages, alleging Cambridge was guilty of tortious interference with contract and tortious interference with business expectancy. The RIA argued that Cambridge and Di Vincenzo were guilty of business conspiracy and common-law civil conspiracy, and that Di Vincenzo was guilty of breach of contract.

But U.S. District Judge Roderick C. Young, on Monday, granted the defendants’ motion to dismiss the claims against them “for lack of subject matter jurisdiction” and compelled the parties to arbitrate, “because the dispute is subject to a binding arbitration clause,” he said in a memorandum opinion.

A three-person arbitration panel, on March 3, 2022, ruled in favor of Di Vincenzo, according to an award posted at the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority’s website.

The panel granted nearly every relief claim requested by Di Vincenzo and denied in its entirety the counterclaim of Devin Garofalo, who had bought Di Vincenzo’s business. The panel awarded $591,238 in compensatory damages “for Garofalo’s default” of the asset purchase agreement, $957,400 in compensatory damages “for Garofalo’s failure to remit commissions” to Di Vincenzo, and $490,639 in attorney’s fees.

Cambridge and attorneys for the defendants and plaintiff didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday about the judge’s decision.