The UDRP case regarding COUNTRYGIRL.com

 

  
     
 

LML Investments LLC. (owner of Country Girl branded clothing) represented by Indiana based Jeremiah A. Pastrick of Continental Enterprises loses UDRP case in its attempt to unfairly grab 16 year old COUNTRYGIRL.com domain name.

National Arbitration Forum Panelists said that the Complainant's case was "Devoid of Merit" and, citing "Unacceptable actions of Complainant and its Counsel", found LML Investments LLC. and Jeremiah A. Pastrick of Continental Enterprises guilty of Reverse Domain Name Hijacking.

  
 


Unanimously all of the three panelists agreed that the countrygirl.com domain name had neither been registered in bad faith nor was the COUNTRYGIRL.com domain name being used in bad faith and furthermore that Respondent is legally free to offer the domain for sale at any price it wishes


  
  The NAF panelists stated : "Complainant is attempting to deprive Respondent, the rightful, registered holder of the disputed domain name, of its rights to use the disputed domain name. Complainant and its counsel should have known that they would be unable to prove at least two of the elements needed to prevail. Even a cursory review of the URDP and UDRP decisions would have alerted Complainant and its counsel to the fact that its case was devoid of merit."  
     
  The NAF panelists wrote:  
 


Neither registered in bad faith:

"Respondent's registration of the disputed domain name in 1998 predates Complainant's registration of the Country Girl mark by seven years.  This predation precludes any serious claim of registering the disputed domain name in bad faith as Complainant's rights in the Country Girl mark did not even exist when Respondent registered the disputed domain name. Therefore, there is no evidence of bad faith under Policy 4(a)(iii).

nor used in bad faith:

"the Panel finds that Respondent has rights in the domain name at issue which far predate and are superior in some respects to those of Complainant, it is clear that Respondent is legally free to offer the domain for sale at any price it wishes.  Complainant's argument in this regard is completely frivolous and clearly offered in bad faith."

LML Investments LLC. represented by Indiana based Jeremiah A. Pastrick of Continental Enterprises had their complaint denied. The respondent was represented by Ari Goldberger of Esqwire.com.

The NAF ruling on the case (LML Investments LLC v. P.A. Gordon) can be found at Case No.: FA1407001571756

 
 

The panelists' concluding paragraphs sums up by saying:

"Even a cursory review of the URDP and UDRP decisions would have alerted Complainant and its counsel to the fact that its case was devoid of merit. Thus, the Panel holds that reverse domain name hijacking has occurred." and "Reverse Domain Name Hijacking is found on account of the unacceptable actions of Complainant and its counsel."


  
 
 
 

There are news stories about the countrygirl.com domain name UDRP case on: DomainNameWire.com "Owner of CountryGirlStore.com guilty of reverse domain name hijacking" and
TheDomains.com "Esqwire.com Gets Another Reverse Domain Name Hijacking Ruling: CountryGirl.com"

There are numerous sources for "Reverse Domain Name Hijacking".  Amongst these are RDNH.com and HallOfShame.com (which includes a current list of those found guilty of trying to Reverse Hijack a Domain Name in which they had no legal rights. In other words they tried to bully the rightful owners into relinquishing their property and forcing these innocent parties to spend thousands to defend what they already own). 

See also Does the UDRP do more harm than good? and The UDRP: A Problem at the Core of the Internet

 

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