Legal News

Doll Order: 9th Circuit Gives Bratz a Reprieve

By Ashby Jones

Parents of girls of a certain age, rejoice! Thanks to a Ninth Circuit ruling out late Wednesday, you can run home and tell your daughters that, yes, that long-coveted pouty-lipped big-headed Bratz doll might end up under the tree after all.

The Ninth Circuit on Wednesday ruled that Bratz maker MGA Entertainment can continue selling its dolls, despite the stinging defeat it suffered last year a jury when a Riverside, Calif., jury awarded Mattel, Inc. $100 million in damages in a closely followed copyright-infringement lawsuit.

MGA was initially ordered to transition its Bratz line to Mattel by 2010, but the Ninth Circuit stayed the order on Thursday until it can rule on MGA’s substantive appeal. Click here for the WSJ story.

Before the ruling, MGA faced the prospect not only of having to turn its Bratz product line over to Mattel in January, but also of having to spend millions of dollars to buy back and destroy its Bratz dolls still on toy stores’ shelves. That would have been an expensive proposition for a private company trying to introduce a new line of dolls, Moxie Girlz.

MGA chief executive Isaac Larian, celebrated the ruling, saying,”The Court’s stay is good news for all Bratz fans and for anyone who cares about fair competition.”

Citing the continuing legal appeals process, Mattel declined to comment, saying only, “The court has not issued any opinion addressing the merits of the case.”

The judges on the appellate panel, Alex Kozinski, Kim Wardlaw and Stephen Trott, questioned whether the trial judge went too far by awarding MGA’s Bratz doll franchise to Mattel and wondered why he didn’t instead award Mattel a royalty or ownership stake in the company.

In addition to staying a lower court’s order, a panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in Pasadena also ordered that the two companies enter mediation.

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on December 10, 2009 (boomark / email).