Airplane critic gets sued over site -- but insurance pays defense

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

------ Forwarded Message
From: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>
-

Date: Wed, 12 Mar 2003 11:00:49 -0500
From: "Paul Levy" <PLEVY () citizen org>
To: <declan () well com>
Cc: <jimfolts () yahoo com>
Subject: "First they nearly killed me ... now they're suing me!"

That is the theme for the latest in the Internet trademark wars.

Jim Folts, who lives near Knoxville Tennessee, suffered a mishap in a
private plane that he was flying, and he felt that Piedmont Hawthorne
Aviation, an airplane repair shop that had serviced his plane, was
responsible.  He took his problem to the National Transportation Safety
Board, which found that Piedmont Hawthorne was responsible.  But when
Folts set up a website titled Aircraft Pilots for Better Maintenance,
and used Piedmont Hawthorne's name is his domain name and meta tags,
Piedmont Hawthorne sued Folts alleging trademark and defamation
theories.

Piedmont appears to have sued the wrong guy, at the wrong time.  It is
the wrong guy because Folts doesn't like being pushed around and, it
turns out, he has the luxury of being able to afford to stand up for his
free speech rights because Folts is covered for this lawsuit by his
insurance.  So he is going to have a fully financed and high-class
defense.  Indeed, the first thing I ask any cybergriper who comes to me
is, do you have insurance coverage so that you can hire a lawyer.  If
more people thoughy about this BEFORE they got threatened with
litigation, they'd be a lot better off.  Second, the lawsuit was filed
within days after the Sixth Circuit decided Taubman v. Mishkoff, which
would seem to preclude the trademark claims altogether.   (we actually
decided not to take the case because, in light of Taubman, it seemed
clear to us that the trademark claims were untenable and the only real
issues in the case was deframation for which a local lawyer would be
better)

The story, including information about the lawsuit, is now on Folts'
website at http://www.aircraft-maintenance.com .  He stopped using the
Piedmont-related domain name after he consulted a local lawyer.   Now
that he has experienced trademark counsel, however, that may well
change.



Paul Alan Levy
Public Citizen Litigation Group
1600 - 20th Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20009
(202) 588-1000
http://www.citizen.org/litigation/litigation.html


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