California court grants Yuga labs permission to knock off the counterarguments in the Bored Apes NFT trademark lawsuit.
The case was held at the court under the jurisdiction of the Central District of California. The case was ruled in favor of Yuga Labs by federal lawmaker Judge John F. Walter.
The counterclaims of the intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress were ruled out abiding by California’s statute which bars strategic lawsuits against public participation. The judge also granted Yuga attorneys’ fees and costs related to the accused charges.
The verdict read that Ripps and Cahens who are the defendants of the case did not allege the extreme or outrageous behavior of Yuga Labs sufficient to maintain the counterclaims.
The judge further wrote in the verdict that instead of coming under this the alleged conduct, in this case, amounts to a garden variety of litigation-related activities, public relations activities, and a handful of other communications incidental to the public dispute between the parties.
Yuga Labs had sent an email statement that read the move by Ripps and Cahen was an attempt to improperly use their own counterclaims to silence the efforts of Yuga Labs to protect Bored Ape Yacht Club, its NFT collection.
The email further read that the move was also evidence for proving that the litigation was about the obvious and blatant theft of the defendant in which, who stole the trademark of Yuga Labs.
The six counterclaims by Ripps and Cahen are:
One, Yuga Labs was aware of the misrepresentation of infringing activity,
Two, declaratory judgment of no copyright under 17 U.S.C. § 102(a),
Three, declaratory judgment of no copyright under 17 U.S.C. § 204(a),
Four, intentional infliction of emotional distress,
Five, negligent infliction of emotional distress, and
Six, declaratory judgment of no declaration
It was back in 2022 June that Yuga Labs filed a lawsuit against Ripps and Cahne for citing trademark infringement, cybersquatting, intentional interference with prospective economic advantage, and related charges.
The lawsuit has been going on since under the name RR/BAYC. The defendants had responded that the trademarks were owned by them and accused Yuga Labs of knowingly and materially misrepresenting its rights in the BAYC NFTs.
The other accusations included that Yuga Labs had engaged in an outrageous retaliatory campaign against Ripps and Cahens, lied about the trademark ownership, intimidated and threatened the defendants, and causes emotional distress.
The counterclaims by the defendants were made in the December of last year. They had also made an appeal in the court’s decision that rejected their Anti-SLAPP motion to dismiss the suit.
Ripps stated that the lawsuit had the intention to silence them and continued that his lawsuit, the RR/BAYC, said that the NFTs are secured under free speech which comes as a criticism of the neo-Nazi and the alt-right visualizations. These were the words that he used to describe the NFT collection by Yuga Labs.
The Yuga Labs’ Bored Ape Yacht NFT collection features apes wearing different clothes and accessories and is engaged in different activities.
The federal judge however did not the counterclaim of Ripps and Cahens that said Yuga Labs had knowingly and materially misrepresented the RR/BAYC NFTs and infringed its copyright by its cation that filed takedown notices under the Digital Millenium Copyright Act.
He added that the issue would be better resolved through a motion for summary judgment.
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Walter stated that Yuga Labs had already said that its motion for the summary judgment had been filed under seal previously this month.
He continued that it demonstrated that the single counterclaim moving forward was actually meritless and the that court had expected a more strong one. He mentioned that wherever the court would discuss it.
It was further in January that Yuga Labs filed a motion to strike and dismiss the whole case. The defendants had submitted an appeal against the now verdict of the Judge.
So far, RR/BAYC made an earning of 1.6 million US dollars in sales. The estimated value of Yuga Labs is 4 billion US dollars. 15 percent of the RR/BAYC was collected by Lehman.
In January Yuga Labs brought the case to the notice of the District Court of New York and argued about the part Lehman had in the money loss of Yuga Labs. The case argued that the RR/BAYC project has more than 1,000 NFT projects similar to the BAYC.
Even the names and other traits are similar to the BAYC NFTs. This has reportedly caused confusion among buyers and investors. Yuga Labs mentioned that they had faced a loss of many buyers due to this misrepresentation.
Yuga Labs filed a case citing that the trademark ownership of the BAYC collection was owned by it and therefore it was illegal for the other party to conduct business in this way that had caused a potential loss.
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