Photography / Image Rights — former employee took trade secrets

I've been trying to resolve this on my own but I'm stuck fwiw.

former employee took trade secrets. I've been dealing with this for about 9 weeks now and the situation isn't improving.

This involves original creative work over the past 7 months. I do have documentation proving my ownership and timeline.

What are the risks if I pursue this? What's the likely timeline?

Have you tried reaching out to your state's legal aid society? They sometimes have free resources or mediation services fr fr.

This happened to me too. Have you tried filing a complaint with the relevant agency? In my case they investigated and it got resolved without needing a lawyer.