Domain was obviously registered and used in good faith, but this company filed a cybersquatting complaint anyway.
A frozen agricultural products company has been found guilty of attempting to reverse hijack the domain name sunleaf.com.
This case was dead on arrival. A quick visit to sunleaf.com shows a message from the domain registrant, who operated a business and used the domain for many years:
Hello To All Of Our Long-time Friends and Customers,
How to even start this letter???
After a very successful, fulfilling, prosperous, learning, grateful, friend making and yes, at times extremely ‘trying’ nursery career, we (Bob & Carol) have chosen to find out what the next adventure is that life has to offer us. We are closing Sunleaf Nursery LLP after this Fall season. With over 85 years between the two of us in the nursery industry, we have decided that now is the time to move on and to be able to enjoy all of the other opportunities that are available.
The Complainant even admitted in its filing that the domain wasn’t registered in bad faith. It instead just argued it was used in bad faith.
Panelist Charles A. Kuechenmeister was having none of it. Rather than go through all elements of the UDRP, he squashed it quickly:
Normally the Panel would evaluate the evidence applicable to each of the three elements listed in Policy ¶ 4(a) but the circumstances present here render that unnecessary. As stated in the Complaint and supported by the evidence, the domain name was registered in 1999 (WHOIS printouts submitted as Complaint Annexes A and B) by the named Respondents, who, according to the statement appearing on the resolving website (screenshots submitted as Complaint Annexes F and G), were doing business as Sun Leaf Nursery, LLP until they decided to close the business at the end of 2015. Complainant appears not to have acquired rights in the SUN LEAF mark until the April 2008 first use date shown on the USPTO registration certificate submitted as Complaint Annex C. This sequence of events precludes a finding of bad faith registration. Indeed, the Complaint as much as admits that.
In finding reverse domain name hijacking, he wrote:
The deficiencies in Complainant’s case are glaring. The domain name was registered some nine years before Complainant acquired any rights in the SUN LEAF mark. And, it was registered for a legitimate business that remained in operation, using the domain name for some 15 years before closing its doors. Complainant’s counsel should have realized immediately that it could not prevail. There is a substantial body of jurisprudence in existence from the 25 years that the Policy has been in in effect, and even a cursory review of past UDRP decisions would have alerted counsel that the lack of evidence supporting bad faith registration in this case would preclude recovery. As little as a careful reading of Policy ¶ 4(a)(iii) would have revealed that. The facts here demonstrate that Complainant clearly ought to have known it could not succeed under any fair interpretation of facts reasonably available prior to the filing of the Complaint. Reverse domain name hijacking is found.
Companies filing cybersquatting disputes while knowing the domain wasn’t registered in bad faith has become a disturbing pattern.
Key Kesan Dallman PLLC represented the Complainant and the domain owner did not respond to the dispute.
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