A federal judge in the Southern District of New York issued an order on Wednesday for bootleg vendors who have been selling counterfeit Knicks and Rangers gear outside of Madison Square Garden to stop immediately and appear in court, according to a report by Front Office Sports. The order comes two days after MSG Sports filed a lawsuit against the vendors on intellectual property grounds.
In their lawsuit against vendors who have been hawking counterfeit merchandise, MSG Sports claimed the vendors have been using their intellectual property and registered trademarks for their own commercial benefit, lack proper permits and have also been "aggressive and belligerent towards pedestrians" outside of Madison Square Garden, while also creating safety issues due to increased crowding before and after games. MSG Sports had asked the court to authorize state and local police as well as MSG security to seize and impound counterfeit merchandise, while also claiming they are entitled to damages triple the sellers' profit.
On Wednesday, Judge Margaret Garnett issued a temporary restraining order against the defendants over the next two weeks while also ordering them to appear in court on Feb. 13. Interestingly, the lawsuit does not name any specific vendors of counterfeit merchandise or specify how many of them there are, referring to them only as "various John Does, Jane Does and XYZ Companies."
"Counterfeit merchandise is deceptive to our fans, and we are pleased the judge agreed and affirmed our right to protect our trademarks," an MSG Sports spokesperson told Front Office Sports.
The actions by MSG Sports continue what has been a crackdown on the sale of counterfeit sports merchandise by teams across the country. In April of this year, for instance, law enforcement in Los Angeles seized approximately $140,000 worth of bootleg Lakers merchandise being sold by vendors outside of Crypto.com Arena.