ANALYSIS: DOJ’s ‘No-Poach’ Charges Reach a Critical Juncture

The Justice Department has reached a pivotal point in its first wave of criminal complaints against companies and individuals that allegedly conspired to fix wages or to allocate the market for skilled employees, using agreements not to “poach” each other’s workers.

Several defendants in these cases have moved to dismiss the DOJ’s charges. In these motions, currently pending for decision before federal courts in Colorado, Nevada, and Texas, the defendants argue that allocating markets for labor isn’t a crime, and that the defendants couldn’t have known what they were doing was illegal.

If courts start granting these ...