October 30, 2026
Testimony Reframes Spectrum’s Legal Battle With JAW Lighting
Sworn statements expose $3.5M in losses, a disputed hiring promise and Williams’ account of why he left.
“We wouldn’t be sitting here right now if Jim Williams had hired me.”
Rick Vollhardt said that under oath. For roughly 30 years, his Columbus agency, Spectrum Lighting, represented Cooper Lighting in Central Ohio, and he was explaining why he later sued six former employees who had helped him run it. In the same deposition, he testified that he would not have enforced their noncompete agreements if Jim Williams had followed through and given him a job.
That line now sits in a defense brief, where both sides in Spectrum Lighting v. JAW Lighting, et al have asked Judge David C. Young to decide the case without a trial. The last brief was filed October 26. Together, the depositions, a sworn affidavit from Cooper and internal emails give the fullest account yet of how Cooper’s 2024 bet on a startup agency unraveled. They also revise parts of the story as it was first told, including parts of our own coverage.
From Acquisition Talks to a Job That Never Came
When Spectrum and Vollhardt filed suit on March 3, 2025, the complaint alleged that JAW promised to acquire Spectrum’s assets and employ Vollhardt, then used that access to recruit his staff. Our June 2025 report built its lead around that alleged acquisition offer. In deposition, Vollhardt was asked directly whether Williams ever offered to acquire Spectrum. He answered “No,” explaining that he never offered Spectrum to Williams because Williams “had the main card.” Asked whether he ever spoke with Williams about JAW acquiring Spectrum’s assets, he again answered “No.”
Spectrum’s briefs now rest on a different promise. Vollhardt testified that at an early meeting Williams “offered me a position” and “said I would be GM,” and Spectrum argues he relied on that assurance when he opened his team to JAW’s recruiting. The defense brief cites Vollhardt’s own testimony that the two men never discussed salary, benefits, a start date or job duties.
Williams tells it differently. He testified that Vollhardt asked whether he envisioned him as a general manager and that he “told him no,” because he had just hired a vice president for the territory. According to Williams, Vollhardt called within about 48 hours of their first meeting, said he would probably wind Spectrum down and asked about an opportunity at JAW. Williams said he was “very noncommittal.” About a week later, Williams testified, Vollhardt called “somewhat in a panic,” urging him to come meet Spectrum’s employees before competitors hired them away.
Cooper Lighting Moved First
Some of the most consequential testimony comes from the manufacturer, which is not a party to the case. Williams testified that Cooper approached him in May 2024 about consulting work and later proposed that he form an agency covering territories that included Columbus. On October 21, 2024, Cooper notified Spectrum that it was ending their agreement effective November 30. In a sworn affidavit, Cooper’s head of sales called the decision Cooper’s “independent business judgment” and said neither Williams nor JAW caused it.
The stakes for Spectrum were enormous. According to the defense, citing Vollhardt’s testimony, Cooper accounted for about half of Spectrum’s business. Lutron was its second-largest line and Focal Point roughly its third, and Focal Point ended its relationship within a week of Cooper. Within days, Vollhardt told Lutron: “I don’t think Spectrum is going to be in play. We’ll probably wind it down.”
Spectrum argues that “probably” is doing real work in that sentence. Its lawyers say the agency remained open, kept servicing projects, kept collecting commissions and actively pursued replacement lines. They point to Williams’ own acknowledgment that Spectrum could have continued without its two biggest manufacturers. In Spectrum’s telling, the business was wounded but alive until JAW took what was left.
Each Side’s Best Evidence
Spectrum’s strongest exhibits are emails. In November 2024, while still employed by Spectrum, one former employee offered JAW information about Spectrum’s manufacturer lines, proposed “quietly” contacting those lines and sought a “game plan” to move the business, according to Spectrum’s filings. The emails pitched JAW as “Spectrum’s successor.” Spectrum says Vollhardt fired the employee and walked her out of the building. Spectrum calls the defense’s portrait of a small business that simply failed “a farce.”
The defense has its own exhibits, several of them drawn from Vollhardt’s testimony. Testifying as Spectrum’s designated witness, he could not identify a specific trade secret at issue, according to the defense. Asked what JAW did to conspire with the employees, he said, “I don’t know,” adding that he felt he “got played.” Asked whether Spectrum’s list of manufacturer lines was confidential, he replied: “It’s on the website.”
The defense also points to Vollhardt’s own next move. According to its brief, on December 20, 2024, while Spectrum still existed, Vollhardt sent another Ohio agency, Lighting Dynamics, information on 16 Spectrum lines he hoped to bring with him. He started there February 1, 2025. The defense argues he did exactly what he accuses his former employees of doing.
What Williams Said About Leaving
When JAW exited the market in June 2025, Williams issued a statement citing “recent health considerations.” In an October 2025 deposition, asked about health issues, he said: “No, nothing serious at all.” He testified that he knew by February 2025 that he wanted out, describing weekly travel to Tennessee and time away from home. “It was fun strategically putting something together,” he said, “but I didn’t want to operate the business.” He told Cooper he “didn’t have another ten years in me.”
Asked whether JAW was profitable, Williams said no. “From the inception in September to the end of May, we were three and a half million loss,” he testified. He did not cite the losses as a reason for leaving, and nothing in the record connects the two. The figure still gives important context for an agency that built three territories from scratch in eight months.
The testimony also clarifies how JAW ended. Williams described “a limited asset sale with three different Cooper agents,” one each for Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee. When he told Cooper he wanted out, he testified, the company “immediately stepped up” and said it had agents that wanted bigger geographies. Cooper alone identified the buyers.
The Cooper contract was the main asset, along with computers, sample material and the office leases. Employees were included, though each could choose whether to stay. The deals were signed near the end of June with a June 1 effective date, and Williams never obtained a business valuation. In the Columbus territory, he said, he believed the buyer kept all of JAW’s employees.
Retirement Accounts and a Fight Over Page Counts
The case also runs in the other direction. As we [reported in April], five of the former employees filed counterclaims over Spectrum’s 2024 contributions to their SIMPLE IRA retirement accounts, invoking the federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act. Spectrum made those contributions around December 22, 2025, after the counterclaims were filed, and now argues that the issue is moot. The employees say late payment does not erase the claim.
A smaller fight could still shape the ruling. Spectrum has asked the court to strike JAW’s 23-page opposition brief, arguing it was three days late and eight pages over a 15-page limit. JAW responds that it served the brief on time and that a June 17 court order allowed 23 pages. If the judge sides with Spectrum, he could decide Spectrum’s motion without considering the defense’s main response to it.
What Comes Next
Summary judgment lets a judge resolve claims without a trial when the key facts are not genuinely in dispute. Each side argues that standard favors it. The record, however, contains a direct conflict at its center: Vollhardt says he was promised a job, and Williams says he declined to offer one. Questions about what was said in private conversations are often left for trial, though that is a general observation about how courts work, not a prediction about this one. The court had not ruled on either motion as of the October 26 filing.
Whatever Judge Young decides, the record offers a lesson for every rep agency that depends on a few major lines. Spectrum lost roughly half its business under a contract that let Cooper walk away on 30 days’ written notice. Everything that followed, from the job conversations to the emails to the lawsuit, happened under that pressure. For lighting people who run agencies, the testimony is a reminder that when the biggest line walks, the next conversations matter as much as the contract did.
