FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTACT: Jan Heying
(619) 293-3175
Kim Craft
(714) 957-9797
DATE: January 4, 1999
Playboy Playmate of the Year 1981 files counterclaim against Playboy Enterprises, Inc., citing corporate intimidation, harassment and coercion
Terri Welles, Playboy Playmate of the Year 1981, today filed a counterclaim in Federal District Court in San Diego, California, accusing Playboy Enterprises, Inc. (PEI) of defaming her, unlawfully interfering with her website business (www.terriwelles.com) and engaging in unfair business practices under California statutory law.
Welles, of Del Mar, California, contends in her counterclaim that she and her business have been targeted by Playboy, and its founder Hugh Hefner, for refusing to back down in a dispute initiated by Playboy Enterprises, Inc. which sought to prevent her from utilizing her titles "Playmate of the Month" and "Playboy Playmate of the Year 1981" on her website which she opened in June 1997.
Playboy contended in a February 1998 federal court lawsuit that use of the "Playmate" titles by Welles violated federal trademark laws. However, in May 1998, Judge Judith Keep of the United States District Court for the Southern District of California rejected Playboy's request for preliminary injunction in an eleven-page written opinion stating, in part:
"From the papers submitted and the oral arguments, it appears that the terms Playmate, Playmate of the Month, and Playmate of the Year are titles which Playboy magazine awards to certain Playboy models, who then use the title to describe themselves. Much like Academy Award winners, all the crowned Miss Americas, and the Heisman trophy winners, Playboy Playmates are given a title which becomes part of their identity and adds value to their name. Indisputably, these winners represent the awarding organization or sponsor, but the title becomes part of who they are to the public."
Judge Keep further stated,
"In this case, Ms. Welles has used PEI's trademarks to identify herself truthfully as the Playmate of the Year 1981. Such use is not "taboo" under the law."
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Terri Welles v. Playboy
2-2-2
On October 27, 1998, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Playboy's appeal of the denial of the preliminary injunction, finding that Judge Keep acted properly in denying the request for injunctive relief.
Welles' counterclaim, came in response to Playboy's recent effort to amend its complaint in the wake of Judge Keep's adverse ruling to add new claims against Welles and her business. According to her counterclaim, Welles and others like her have continuously and repeatedly used their titles Playmate of the Month and Playmate of the Year to describe themselves in promoting their careers without objection and, in fact, with encouragement from Playboy. According to her counterclaim, when Welles and others refused to participate in Playboy's own on-line venture, they were told they could no longer refer to themselves as such and threatened with legal and other action. It was then, according to Welles' counterclaim, that Playboy "commenced a pattern of corporate intimidation, harassment and coercion designed to compel [her] to abandon her otherwise lawful activity and join the PEI Cyber Club and, failing that, to disparage her, destroy her business, and make an example of her, such that others would be deterred from engaging in such lawful activity."
Welles' counterclaim, filed by attorney David J. Noonan of the San Diego law firm Post Kirby Noonan & Sweat, seeks damages and a declaration by the Court to prevent future suits by Playboy against her and others of use of the name "Playmate of the Year."
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