Nucor settles lawsuit against former manager

A lawsuit that Nucor Corp. filed against a former high-ranking executive at its Berkeley County steel mill and his new employer over alleged theft of confidential information has been settled.

Nucor said it was precluded from discussing the financial terms of the settlement with John Bell, its former melt shop manager in Huger, and SeverCorr, a Mississippi steel mill operator started by a former chief executive officer at Nucor.

The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in Charleston in October 2006. Charlotte-based Nucor alleged Bell took proprietary information about its steelmaking processes when he left the company in March 2006 to join SeverCorr.

Bell, who joined SeverCorr in fighting the lawsuit for almost two years, could not be reached for comment Tuesday at his Mount Pleasant home or his Mississippi office.

The legal settlement prohibits SeverCorr from using Bell's services to prepare or manufacture certain grades of steel until June 2009. The court also approved an order barring SeverCorr from "producing, qualifying, promoting or marketing any ability to produce and sell" those grades of steel "to prospective or actual customers" until September 2009.

"Nucor's advancements in steelmaking have helped us become one of the largest, most profitable steelmakers in the world," Dan DiMicco, Nucor's president and CEO, said in a statement Tuesday. "These advances are the direct result of the hard work of all of our employees, and we have an obligation to our employees and shareholders to protect the intellectual property, confidential information and trade secrets associated with the advancements made through our collective efforts. That is what we did in this case; that is what we will do in the future."

Bell was named melt shop manager at Nucor's Berkeley when it opened in 1995. In 2004, he was named general manager of steelmaking technologies at Nucor.

Bell is now executive vice president and general manager of operations at Columbus, Miss.-based SeverCorr, which was launched by John D. Correnti after his 1999 ouster as Nucor's president and CEO. Correnti left SeverCorr earlier this year, after the company was sold to Russian steelmaker Severstal.

See Wednesday's Post and Courier for more details.