Chanel Being Railroaded

Far be it that a high profile company such as Chanel Perfume would lie, but that seems to be the case with Chanel Richards, a Toronto-based escort. http://adultfyi.com/read.aspx?ID=5755. We realize that a lot of porn fans may have been tuning into Jerry's Telethon on Labor Day rather than scouring the Internet and may not be aware of the story we did on Richards. You can read the link we've provided, but the Cliff Note's version is the fact that Chanel Perfume, taking umbrage to the fact that Richards uses the name Chanel, took time out of its business day to threaten her with legal action unless she agreed to terms. Richards agreed to all those terms but Chanel, acting like a corporate bully, is still threatening her. Here are the letters Chanel has sent her

SENT BY E-MAIL [[email protected]]ORDINARY MAILWITHOUT PREJUDICEMontreal, November 24, 2003XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Toronto, Ontario XXXXXX

Dear XXXXXXXXXX:

Further to our telephone conversation of the last week of October, we have now received instructions from our client.This will confirm your advice received during our telephone conversation in the last week of October 2003 that you have no documentation of any kind whatsoever relating to your business which has thereon our client's famous trade-mark CHANEL or its famous Bottle Design trade-mark which is under your control or in your possession or presently on order by you.

We have also now had time to review your website and note the change made to remove the Bottle Design trade-mark of our client. This is satisfactory. We note however that no other changes were made to the site. Thus, you continue to use our client's famous trade-mark CHANEL on that site. This is unacceptable.

Furthermore, our client requires you to transfer the domain name "sexychanel.com" to its related company Chanel Inc. Of course, our client will pay any Registrar's fees for transferring same.

Should you refuse to make such a transfer, then our client or any one of its related companies will proceed with a Complaint under the Uniform Dispute Resolution Policy of ICANN in order to have the said domain name transferred to it.

This having been said, our client would be willing to allow you to use as a domain name "sexychannel.com" provided:

a) You will remove all reference to our client's trade-mark CHANEL from your website;b) Your use of "sexychannel" as a domain name (and should you wish to use this domain name on your website) must not be in a way which is confusing with our client's trade-mark CHANEL;c) There must be no links on your website using our client's trade-mark CHANEL nor sending viewers to a website which includes our client's trade-mark CHANEL.

We understand that you cannot change the domain name already registered and therefore you will have to assign same to our client as requested above. Nevertheless, you will be able to re-register a domain name for "sexychannel.com", should you wish to do so and should it be available. Our client is willing to pay the Registrar's fees for obtaining this new domain name registration.

We look forward to hearing from you within seven (7) business days of the date of this letter.Yours truly,

Daniel I. LackDIL/fb

SENT BY E-MAIL [[email protected]]BY BAILIFFWITHOUT PREJUDICEMontreal, February 17, 2004XXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Toronto, Ontario XXXXXX

Dear XXXXXXXX:

Further to our letter of November 24, 2003 to which we have not received your response, we are writing to advise that unless you change your business name as well as your address to something other than Chanel, we have now received instructions to institute court action against you.

Our client has been extremely reasonable and patient until this point. However, as previously indicated, our client cannot and will not continue to allow you to use its world famous trade-mark CHANEL. As we have previously indicated, our client would be willing to allow you to use "Channel" as your business name and as your domain name. In addition, it could accept "Chanelle" or even "Shanel".

Furthermore, our client would be willing to allow you up until July 1, 2004 to notify your clientele of your change of name.

We look forward to receiving your confirmation within seven (7) days of the date of this letter that you will cease using our client's world famous trade-mark CHANEL by July 1, 2004 and also your advice as to the new name you have chosen.

Yours truly,

Daniel I. LackDIL