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Feds Target "Mongols" Biker Club's Intellectual Property
couchslug writes in with a Reuters account of a Federal raid on a California-based motorcycle club, the Mongols, on charges "ranging from murder and robbery to extortion, money laundering, gun trafficking and drug dealing." The interesting twist is that the authorities are asking the courts to seize the IP of the biker club — specifically, their trademarked name "Mongols." "Federal agents and police in seven states arrested more than 60 members of the Mongols motorcycle gang on Tuesday in a sweep that also targeted for the first time an outlaw group's 'intellectual property,' prosecutors said. The arrests cap a three-year undercover investigation in which US agents posed as gang members and their girlfriends to infiltrate the group, even submitting to polygraph tests administered by the bikers ... [T]he name 'Mongols,' which appears on the gang's arm patch insignia, was trademarked by the group. The indictment seeks a court order outlawing further use of the name, which would allow any police officer 'who sees a Mongol wearing this patch ... to stop that gang member and literally take the jacket right off his back' ..."
If police informants can pass and beat a polygraph in a situation where they would be killed on the spot*, then how can the same test when used against people charged with a crime is still admissible as evidence?
*if the common perception of the 1%-ers is to be belived
The indictment seeks a court order outlawing further use of the name, which would allow any police officer 'who sees a Mongol wearing this patch... to stop that gang member and literally take the jacket right off his back'..."
Some douche licker apparently never heard of the right of first sale.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
Ummm... no. Really. Tell me you don't believe that, please. "If you can put it on a t-shirt, then it's free speech." isn't just a witty one liner ya know. Trademarks control trade. It may be illegal to sell a t-shirt with someone else's logo on it, but there's no law against wearing one.
How we know is more important than what we know.
So we would still be able to wear swastikas, KKK logos, Iran Revolutionary Guard insignias and NWA "Fuck the Police" t-shirts, but a patch from some gang most of the world never heard of would be a crime?
Airplane Photos, Airline News, Planespotting Guides
I grew up in L.A. and had an integrated social circle that drew from a pretty wide swath of communities. After what happened in '92 there was legally sanctioned trouble for people wearing certain clothes, having certain tattoos etc. I know that someone will inevitably point out that the policies were eventually scaled back, but there was a time in L.A. where law abiding youths of certain appearances/demographics literally had to fear the legally authorized power wielded by police.
IIRC the Rampart scandal grew out of policies put in place after '92...
The world has changed since those days, and I fear that this development is not pipe dream bullshit as you suggest.
On another note: Forgive the Godwin, and correct me if I am wrong, but don't some European countries have criminal penalties for displaying a swastika even in the form of satire or parody?
In the US, but this is beyond the pale. There are already laws like RICO which can be used to shut down corrupt organizations.
If this is allowed to set precedent, the Feds will literally be allowed to steal a company's trademark if anyone employed by the company does something illegal. I'm reminded of the Steve Jackson Games fiasco where the Feds seized their computers because one of their employees illegally downloaded a document from AT & T that same was selling for $17. (IIRC)
I seriously doubt that seizing a gang's name is going to deter them the least. At worst, they'll just change their name. This is more about expanding the power of the Federal government than it is about law enforcement. With civil forfeiture laws extending to copyright violations, soon the day will come when police departments will shore up their budgets by seizing computers under the guise of copyright enforcement ("Can you prove that copy of Windows wasn't pirated? I didn't think so...")
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
For all of you alarmists that claimed IP regulation would be misused by the government and reach beyond trade and artistic works were totally off base. It hasn't led to rampant surveillance, corporate intimidation of citizens and small businesses, or the police indiscriminately stopping motorists and tearing the clothes off their backs. Oh crap, it has? Is it too late to change our minds?
No...I gotta go with the other poster, what you wear should give the police NO reason to pull you over, even if a trademarked logo is taken over, that does not prohibit ANYONE from wearing it, nor does it present reasonable cause for pulling someone over.
If pulling someone over just for what they wear or look like is on the books...then we are really in serious trouble in the states.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
And if you made it yourself?
Staying together in a group is simply advantageous tactically, and doesn't say anything about the strength or weakness of its members. Let us know how it works out the next time you go up to a lone Mara Salvatrucha member and call him a pussy.
Please stand clear of the doors, por favor mantenganse alejado de las puertas
1. That's a business, not an individual.
2. It was a permanent public installation, not an item of clothing on a private person.
3. The pictures probably stayed up for weeks while the matter was being resolved. I know of nothing that would have required them to take it down immediately upon Eisener's request.
4. They technically *chose* to take it down to get Disney to drop the suit. They could have taken them to court to drag out the process for months.
If a cop saw a biker wearing the logo, he couldn't do anything there on the spot. He couldn't even issue a citation, because it's not a criminal issue.
Not only will the injunction outlawing the logo will fail spectacularly on 1st amendment grounds, but the very concept of outlawing a gang's insignia will just give the Mongols additional street cred, as they are now more-badass-than-thou.
"Our gang is so bad, our insignia is illegal. The very mention of our name will get you arrested. Think about us and you're committing a crime, brother!" Etc.
It just gives the gang additional appeal to the probable suckers who'd join a criminal biker gang in the first place.
If you affiliate yourself with the FBI, you are, in fact, affiliating yourself with people KNOWN for illegal acts.
If you affiliate yourself with Microsoft, Exxon, ADM..., you are, in fact, affiliating yourself with people KNOWN for illegal acts.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
Sorry for going ad hominem on you, but the mis-use of the term 'Nazi' for 'grammar nazi' etc is bad enough.
But to imply that by creating legal countermeasures to the glorification and/or denying of the Nazi homocide, crimes, regime and lore, the German government has become the thing they are trying to prevent is so utterly and totally ignorant, stupid, demeaning, wrong and a hundred other bad and worse things it makes me wonder why you are able to remember to breathe.
You are trivializing the Third Reich and its crimes in a way I have only seen from people who are actual neo-Nazis.
The same goes, to quite some extent, to whoever modded you Insightful.
I would appreciate a reply from both you & whoever modded you in a positive way (which would eleminate some mod points in the process).
Why hide behind Hinduism? Neo-Nazis have just as much right to bear a swastika. Free speech for some but not others isn't free speech.