In the Courts

On May 5, 2017, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit set aside the convictions of Walter Liew, a Chinese-American engineer, for witness tampering and making false statements to the court. Notably, the Ninth Circuit upheld Liew's 2014 conviction on the theft of trade secrets and subsequent sale of those secrets to state-owned Chinese companies.

In May 2009, after filing for bankruptcy with his previous company, Liew formed USA Performance Technology, Inc. (USAPTI) and signed a $17.8 million dollar project contract with the Pangang Group (Pangang), a Chinese state-controlled company, for the construction of a Titanium Dioxide (TiO2) facility in Chongquing, China. TiO2 is a white pigment commonly used for a variety of products, including paint and Oreo cookie filling. To assist him with the design and construction of the plant, Liew employed two former engineers from E. I. DuPont de Nemours and Company (DuPont), the world's largest TiO2 producer. Upon receiving an anonymous letter about USAPTI's activities, DuPont suspected that Liew and his business associates stole confidential trade secrets from the company, including information regarding the process and equipment required to build a titanium dioxide production line, the architecture of a plant system, and an internal report about the computer model for a chemical process.