It may be Award season for all of Hollywood, but there is one man in America that won’t be up for an Oscar this year.
RadarOnline.com has exclusively learned that the Academy Awards filed a lawsuit on Feb. 6 against Texas man Jaime De La Rosa for manufacturing, importing, and selling fake Oscar statuettes on eBay and Etsy.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts And Sciences “seeks injunctive relief and damages for copyright infringement, trademark infringement, trademark dilution, and false representation,” court papers obtained by Radar stated.
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“De La Rosa operates (1) a store on the eBay Web site (ww.ebay.com) in the form of an online auction and shopping site under the username ‘jjleo0205 and (2) an online store on the Etsy Web site (www.etsy.com) under store name ‘QuietOnTheSet’ and user name ‘Jaime De La Rosa,’” the suit said.
The academy also sued 10 other individuals, but listed them in the paperwork against De La Rosa as “Does 1 through 10.”
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According to the court papers, Does 1 through 5 “manufactured, imported, or procured counterfeit replica ‘Oscar’ statuettes for De La Rosa to sell in derogation of the Academy’s rights.”
Does 6 through 10 helped De La Rosa with the sale of the counterfeit statuettes.
The issue was first brought to the attention of the Academy in November 2013 when they found out about a listing on eBay called “Academy Award Hollywood Metal Movie Acting Trophy Prop Replica” with one of the fake statutes being sold for $850.
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The Academy claimed that the contacted De La Rosa, but he continued to sell the replicas — one replica was even being sold for the price of $5,000 on his Etsy store.
The Academy sued De La Rosa for copyright infringement and is asking for an injunction against him to get him to stop selling the fake statues.
They are also demanding $150,000 in damages from the defendant.
“The Academy is entitled to recover three times the defendants’ profits and the Academy’s damages, reasonable attorneys’ fees, and the cost of this action,” the papers said.
