School of Visual Arts v. Kuprewicz

Citation: School of Visual Arts v. Kuprewicz, 3 Misc. 3d 278, 771 N.Y.S.2d 804 (N.Y. Sup. Ct. 2003).

Factual Background
Defendant, a former employee of plaintiff School of Visual Arts (“SVA”), placed two false job listings on “craigslist.com” stating that SVA was seeking a Director of Human Resources, a position that was already held by plaintiff Pearlberg. Defendant also sent an e-mail to SVA’s human-resources department with a similar job listing that was created to look like a legitimate listing on the “monster.com” job site. And defendant also provided Pearlberg’s e-mail address to various pornographic websites causing her to receive numerous sexually explicit e-mails.

Trial Court Proceedings
Plaintiffs sued defendant for numerous claims, including trademark dilution claiming that the false job postings created a negative perception of SVA. Defendant moved to dismiss all claims for failure to state a cause of action. The court granted defendant’s motion regarding SVA’s dilution claim because defendant’s conduct was non-commercial. Indeed, SVA failed to even allege any commercial uses of its mark or that defendant’s use of the mark in any way affected SVA’s business.

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