Toytrackerz Declares Itself . . . #2

Post #2

After talking it over with our lawyer, I decided to file a 'Declaratory Judgment' action in Kansas state court. This type of action, in a nutshell, is to ask a judge to decide the dispute as to whether or not we were infringing on any protected rights held by APE.

A Declaratory Judgment is sort of backwards from a typical lawsuit. Usually, you go to court and say someone did you wrong. [Ya know, 'You got your peanut butter in my chocolate]. In a Dec Judgment, you ask the judge to rule that you HAVEN'T done anything wrong. This is a common lawsuit after when someone sends a Cease & Desist letter.

I served the original petition with a summons on APE via their registered agent right after the first of the year.

On the day the lawsuit was served, all of our eBay auctions were pulled by someone calling themselves 'marxtoysip@yahoo.com'

On that same morning [January 9th I do believe], the Circle X Ranch and Trading Post sites on Yahoo! went dark for several hours. I don't have proof, but I believe the same people tried to bring our sites down. Yahoo! has a high standard of proof required for intellectual property violations and I don't think they met the standard.

That same morning, I got a Restraining Order from the judge preventing interference with our internet businesses during the pendency of the case.

Terri Coop

PS: I intend to make all the public record legal documents available when I figure out how to make .pdf hotlinks.