CORRECTED: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that a preliminary injunction had been granted.

A federal judge in California Tuesday modified a temporary restraining order barring former employees of Accretive Specialty Insurance Solutions LLC and their new employer, XPT Partners LLC, from targeting Accretive clients.

The order in Accretive Specialty Insurance Solutions LLC v. XPT Partners LLC, dba XPT Specialty Insurance Services, Michael Foley and Shawn Arnoldi, in U.S. District Court, Central District of California, Southern District, in Santa Ana follows expedited discovery in the case, which was filed in October.

Accretive, a Torrance, California-based wholesale unit of AssuredPartners Inc., alleged that Mr. Foley and Mr. Arnoldi took confidential files with them when they joined XPT and solicited Accretive clients in breach of their employment agreements. The brokers had joined Accretive through its acquisition of Breckenridge Insurance Services LLC in June and resigned to join XPT in August.

Accretive sued the brokers and XPT, alleging they began soliciting Accretive clients to move their business to XPT prior to resigning, court papers say. The court granted a temporary restraining order on Oct. 13 barring XPT and the brokers from using confidential information from Accretive.

Accretive later submitted emails it found during discovery, which it alleged showed Mr. Foley began planning to join XPT before the completion of Accretive’s acquisition of Breckenridge.

The TRO bars Mr. Foley, Mr. Arnoldi and XPT from “directly and indirectly, offering, selling, soliciting, quoting, placing, providing, renewing, or servicing any insurance product or service to, or on behalf of any client or account” on a list Mr. Foley held of Accretive clients.

In a statement, XPT said neither Mr. Foley nor Mr. Arnoldi have violated any contractual or legal obligations to Accretive.

“This litigation is wholly the result of the conflict created by Accretive’s purchase of Breckenridge, which put Breckenridge’s long-time clients in the position of sending their business to a company that also runs a competing retail broker business in Assured Partners,” the statement said.

A hearing in the case is scheduled for Feb. 9.