The UDRP case regarding SQUIRRELS.COM

 

  
     
 

Squirrels LLC of North Canton, Ohio represented by Law Firm Walker & Jocke loses UDRP case in its attempt to unfairly grab 14 year old squirrels.com domain name.

WIPO Panelists find Squirrels LLC guilty of Reverse Domain Name Hijacking.

  
 


Unanimously all of the three panelists agreed that the squirrels.com domain name had neither been registered in bad faith nor was the squirrels.com domain name being used in bad faith.


  
  The WIPO Panelists stated : "there is no dispute that respondent registered the disputed domain name at least 14 years prior to the time Complainant registered its SQUIRRELS marks. As further noted, it is therefore implausible that respondent could have had intent to profit from Complainant's trademark rights at the time he registered the disputed domain name."  
     
 

Squirrels LLC represented by Law Firm Walker & Jocke had their complaint denied by WIPO the World Intellectual Property Organisation. The respondent was represented by John Berryhill.

The WIPO ruling on the case (Squirrels LLC v. Giorgio Uzonian) can be found at WIPO Case No.: D2014-1434

  

 
 

The panelists' concluding paragraph sums up by saying:

"We find that Complainant acted in bad faith in initiating this UDRP proceeding and engaged in reverse domain name hijacking."


  
 
 
 

Walker & Jocke, the law firm representing Squirrels LLC in this case, is no stranger to reverse domain name hijacking decisions.
Walker & Jocke was the same firm representing complainant Clearwater Systems, Inc. in the UDRP WIPO Case No. D2014-0878 also getting their client guilty of reverse domain name hijacking.

The WIPO panelist was particularly harsh on Walker & Jocke, writing:

"The foregoing applies all the more to the Complainant’s representative. In the Panel’s view, the Complainant’s counsel should have been aware of or informed herself of the fundamental differences between Policy proceedings and US trademark litigation before filing this case."

There are news stories about this UDRP case on DomainNameWire.com Clearwater Systems Guilty of Reverse Domain Name Hijacking

  
 
 
     
 

There are news stories about the squirrels.com domain name UDRP case on  DomainNameWire.com John Berryhill fills Noah’s Ark, gets another reverse domain name hijacking winand on DomainNameStrategy.com Are You Nuts? Squirrels Guilty Of Reverse Hijacking.

There are numerous sources for "Reverse Domain Name Hijacking".  Amongst these are RDNH.com and HallOfShame.com (which includes a current list of those found guilty of trying to Reverse Hijack a Domain Name in which they had no legal rights. In other words they tried to bully the rightful owners into relinquishing their property and forcing these innocent parties to spend thousands to defend what they already own).

See also Does the UDRP do more harm than good? and The UDRP: A Problem at the Core of the Internet

 

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