Business This Week

PAT CHOATE TAKES TRW TO COURT

Economist and author Pat Choate wrote a book last year about Japan's business lobbyists in America, called Agents of Influence. Choate's employer, TRW, fired him before the book was published but after complaints from prominent Japanese.

At the time of the firing, TRW Chairman Joseph Gorman told BUSINESS WEEK that Choate "sensationalized the subject matter." Now, Choate has filed suit against TRW, charging that the company welshed on a $200,000 severance agreement after press accounts linked the firing to complaints by TRW's Japanese customers. TRW denies the charges.EDITED BY HARRIS COLLINGWOOD