A group of former Fortescue employees has failed to convince a court to throw out evidence gathered through a search of their property, in a ruling that boosts Fortescue’s case against the former employees’ company Element Zero.

Fortescue has accused Element Zero founders Michael Masterman, Bart Kolodziejczyk and Bjorn Winther-Jensen of taking intellectual property from Fortescue to advance their green-iron start-up, and Fortescue controversially used surveillance then search-and-seizure methods to gather evidence against them.