Baseball, Intellectual Property, Sports, Trademarks

This May Be The Best Cease And Desist Letter Ever Written

Are the Boston Red Sox facing possible litigation over their World Series beards?

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Here at Above the Law, we’ve brought our readers great responses to cease and desist letters on multiple occasions (see e.g., here and here). It’s about time we shared an epic cease and desist letter with you.

This C&D letter is of great importance to those of you watching the World Series and rooting against the Boston Red Sox. The American Mustache Institute (yes, that exists) allegedly sent this creative piece of genius to Ed Weiss, who serves as the team’s general counsel. It seems the AMI objects to the team’s display of facial hair, claiming that hirsute players — like Mike Carp, Jonny Gomes, Dustin Pedroia, Ryan Dempster, Mike Napoli, Jarrod Saltalamacchia, and David Ross — have “harness[ed] facial hair towards athletic excellence,” thereby infringing upon AMI’s trademark on the “Sexually Dynamic Mustached American Lifestyle.”

This is something you’ll definitely want to read…

AMI claims to be represented by Dewey Ahmadinejad & Houssein, an incredibly fearsome firm bankrupt of empathy for opposing counsel when dropping litigation bombs. Here is the relevant part of the C&D letter, sent by Jean Velue Doppelganger III, AMI’s chief legal affairs and dance coordination coordinator:

[W]hile each member of the Mustached American community appreciates your team’s harnessing of facial hair towards athletic excellence, your marketing of beardism violates the expressed federal trademark of AMI’s ownership of the Sexually Dynamic Mustached American Lifestyle, and in particular, our legal right to approve via “expressed written consent” of any use of said beardism or mustacheularity in marketing the Red Sox’s winning ways or merchandise.

Doppelganger notes that AMI has already filed a request for a temporary or permanent injunction with Judge McKay Chauvin, a jurist without a mustache, but with a wicked appreciation of bow ties. But that’s not all: AMI has apparently already filed a motion for summary judgment, a bold move that only lawyers learned in the madness of mustacheularity would dare attempt in a court of law.

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As you can see, these well-groomed litigation leviathans are not to be screwed with. Mr. Weiss, we firmly suggest that you start growing some facial hair before going to trial with these bearded barristers, because as AMI notes, your “bare-lipped appearance is a sign of weakness and communism.”

P.S. In case you couldn’t tell, this cease and desist letter is about as real as the St. Louis Cardinals’ chances of winning World Series. See Corporate Counsel for the details. Go Sawx!

(If you’re interested, you can read the full C&D letter, in all of its glory, on the next page.)

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