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IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR
THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF WASHINGTON AT SEATTLE
ONEWORLD CHALLENGE, LLC, a Washington Limited
Liability Company, Plaintiff, v. SEAN REEVES, a
New Zealand individual, Defendant.
DECLARATION OF WILLIAM T. TRENKLE
1. I am over the age of 21, am competent to
testify in a court of law, and have personal knowledge
of the facts set forth below.
2. I am the President and Director of Operations
for Team Dennis Conner Corporation, a California
corporation that is conducting an America's Cup
campaign.
3. In roughly late June 2001 I ran into Sean
Reeves and another person at the San Diego Yacht
Club. I think they were having lunch. I stood there
and was chatting with them and at one point the
other person left the table. Reeves said he was
staying in town over the weekend, up in Del Mar.
I think it had come up that that was where I lived.
He asked whether I would like to get together for
coffee over the weekend. I said, yes, fine, if you're
around, I could probably do that.
4. Reeves called me later in that week and said,
okay, why don't we meet at the coffee shop and have
coffee? I met him that day at a coffee shop on the
corner of Pacific Coast Highway and 15th Street
in Del Mar-once again, it was late June. I do not
remember exactly the day. I think it was a Saturday
morning around 8 a.m.
5. We just had some small talk initially and
he asked how the campaign was going. Then he asked
how serious we were about wanting to win the America's
Cup. And I said we were very serious about wanting
to win the America's Cup. He said, would you win
at all costs? I said that was a hard statement to
answer, depends on what the costs are. He said,
I have some information that would help you guys
along. I know your syndicate is behind on the design
program and I have some information that would get
you up the learning curve much quicker. He proceeded
to lay out that he was no longer with OneWorld Challenge,
that he had left them, and that when he left he
was able to retain certain information that was
his property from Team New Zealand and from OneWorld.
He was offering to provide that information to our
syndicate in exchange for a fee.
6. I told Reeves that I did not believe that
it would be legal for us to acquire any of that
information due to the America's Cup Protocol and
the terms of the Protocol. He indicated that there
were ways around that because he was one of the
drafters of the Protocol with Team New Zealand in
2000. I said that I did not believe there was any
way around it, from what he was offering that it
would clearly be a violation and clearly would be
ethically wrong for us to acquire that information.
He proceeded to push that, that there would be ways
around it. I said, not interested.
7. Reeves described the information he was offering
with some specificity. He said that he had the design
for the Team New Zealand Millennium mast and that
he had additional information that came about from
the research that OneWorld had been doing on masts.
He said that he had OneWorld's rig information.
He said that OneWorld had made some big gains in
their mast program, from the millennium rig. He
also said that he had the lines plans for NZL 60
and that he had information as to what Team New
Zealand would do for another boat, the next step,
where he said they were thinking they would go next.
I said that was enough, I did not want to hear any
more. I did not fish for a lot of detail because
we were not buying. We were not interested. I did
not really want to know. I did not want to hear
anymore. The conversation was over very, very quick.
8. He said, well, would you check and see if
Dennis Conner was interested? I said I will check,
but I know he would feel the same way as I feel,
that it is illegal and unsportsmanlike, we do not
want to have anything to do with it. And I said
that is the end of conversation on this. He said
fine.
9. Reeves also talked about the financial arrangements
he had reached with One World. He said they had
come to a settlement on his departure. He expressed
that [he] thought he had been done hard by OneWorld,
that he had been pushed out of the syndicate. He
held a fair amount of malice towards OneWorld because
he felt that he had done so much to start up the
syndicate and then new people came in and he was
pushed out.
10. Reeves called several days later and asked
if I had talked to Dennis Conner about it and made
any decision. I said, yes, I did, and as I said
we had no interest in it.
11. I almost thought this was a set-up. When
Reeves was laying this out it was so unbelievable
that somebody would be offering this information
that I thought maybe this was a very clever ruse
that the OneWorld guys were trying to entrap me
in to agreeing to buy the information and then we
would have been in violation of the Protocol. It
was very bizarre. To me it was just so bizarre that
he would be offering this stuff up. I could not
imagine in my wildest dreams that anyone, no mater
how disgruntled they were about being fired, would
offer this kind of information.
12. I have not talked to Reeves since that conversation.
13. That was the end of the story from our side
of it until later on we heard that Reeves was offering
information to other teams. And then we received
a letter from OneWorld Challenge to all the challengers
asking for information regarding this, at which
point I contacted [OneWorld CEO] Gary Wright and
received a phone call from him and I think their
rules advisor, Marcus McDonald, and told them what
had happened.
14. I have known Sean reeves since 1995 when
he was working for Team New Zealand. I have no antipathy
toward him. I have never had any run-ins, or arguments,
or hostilities with Reeves. In my prior dealings
with him we had worked together and it worked fairly
smoothly and ended on a very friendly note.
I declare under penalty of perjury under the
laws of the United States that the foregoing is
true and correct to the best of my knowledge and
belief.
Executed at San Diego, CA, this 12th day of
February, 2002.
(signed) William T. Trenkle
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