Beatles Counterfeit Suit Seeks to Keep Defendants’ Identities Under Seal

Beatles rights holder Apple Corps and its Subafilms subsidiary, owner of the Yellow Submarine trademark, seek to keep under seal the identities of the defendants it alleges in an accompanying complaint are trafficking in “counterfeits and confusingly similar imitations” of goods over the internet, said their motion Wednesday (docket 0:23-cv-60769) in U.S. District Court for Southern Florida in Fort Lauderdale. The defendants’ counterfeiting and infringing activities are causing “concurrent harm” to the plaintiffs and “an overall degradation of the reputation and goodwill” of the Beatles brand, said the motion. The defendants are listed in a redacted Schedule A in the complaint, referring to them only as “individuals, business entities and unincorporated associations.” Temporarily sealing that portion of the court file will prevent the defendants “from prematurely receiving notice” of the plaintiffs’ investigation “into the operation of their illegal businesses,” it said. The plaintiffs are mindful “of the illicit nature of the counterfeiting business and the ability of counterfeiters to practically eliminate their evidentiary trails” by conducting their business entirely over the internet, it said. They have “good reason to believe” that providing advance notification of their claims would cause the defendants “to hide or transfer their ill-gotten assets, inventory, and related records” beyond the jurisdiction of the court and “thereby thwart” the court’s ability “to grant meaningful relief,” it said. Like many other “famous trademark owners,” the plaintiffs “suffer ongoing daily and sustained violations of their respective trademark rights at the hands of counterfeiters and infringers,” said the complaint. “The exponential growth of counterfeiting” over the internet created an environment that requires companies, such as the plaintiffs, “to expend significant resources across a wide spectrum of efforts in order to protect both consumers and themselves from confusion and the erosion of the goodwill” connected to the Beatles and Yellow Submarine brands, it said.