A spokesman for Lindsay Lohan's spray tanning company denies that it stole its formula from a St. Petersburg chemist.
George Mitchell, president of the lab that helped develop the actor's Sevin Nyne Tanning Mist said it came from his 12 years of experience in the field and not the samples provided by local chemist, Jennifer Sunday.
Sunday filed a federal lawsuit Monday against Lohan and her business partner, Lorit Simons and their companies.
"When requested to help develop the formula for Sevin Nyne,' Mitchell said in an e-mail, "I did so using my expertise and was not provided with any formulas or trade secrets."
Mitchell is the president of United 1 International Laboratories, LLC in Farmers Branch, Texas.
The lawsuit filed in Tampa's federal court contends Sunday's firm, White Wave International Labs, entered into a confidential agreement with Simon's firm in January. The agreement allowed Simons' company, Lorit LLC to examine Sunday's secret suntan spray formula.
When the parties couldn't agree on a price for Simons to buy the formula, the lawsuit contends, the companies worked on a deal in which Simons buy the product in bulk and distribute it.
Sunday said she provided samples to Simons's company and that Sevin Nyne's ingredients were the same or nearly identical to Sunday's formula.
Mitchell said that was at best a coincidence.
He said the ingredients were commonly used in all self-tanning products and there was not anything proprietary about how they are combined.
"I am sorry to hear about the claims made against Lorit, LLC and trust the truth will prevail," Mitchell said.
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