American Apparel shifts attack from Woody Allen to lawyer nemesis

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American Apparel shifts attack from Woody Allen to lawyer nemesis

Thu May 14, 2009 @ 04:23PM PST

By Eriq Gardner


Most companies use ads to build a brand or promote a product. American Apparel would apparently prefer to use its ad budget to make a big point regardless of any legal consequences.

The company is already fighting a legal war with Woody Allen after posting Woody's image on a billboard.

Now it's ramping up a battle with attorney Keith Fink.

Some history about Fink: The lawyer has a reputation for targeting celebrities and others in the entertainment industry. He sued Marilyn Manson for allegedly using the band's money to purchase Nazi skeletons. He sued a Hollywood agent for sexually harassing an assistant by, among other things, making fun of Brad Pitt's genitalia. He went after Ellen DeGeneres over the adoption of a dog. Most recently, Fink squared off against blogger Perez Hilton over the PerezRevenge website.

But Fink's nastiest and most long-running battle has been with American Apparel. Fink represented a former sales manager who sued the company's CEO Dov Charney for sexual harassment, and the two sides have been trading nasty blows in the press for a couple of years.

American Apparel had been buying ads in UCLA's student newspaper lambasting Fink (a lecturer at the school), but apparently the Daily Bruin had enough. So now a new jaw-dropping attack on Fink appears in the May 11th issue of L.A. Business Journal. 

We wonder whether Charney and Co. consulted their lawyers before running this ad (click to enlarge):

Fink[1]

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The Hollywood Reporter
The Hollywood Reporter, Esq. blog focuses on how the entertainment and media industries are impacted and influenced by the law. It is edited by Matthew Belloni with contributions from veteran legal reporter Eriq Gardner and others. Before joining The Hollywood Reporter, Belloni was a lawyer at an entertainment litigation firm in Los Angeles. He writes a column for THR devoted to entertainment law. Gardner is a New York-based writer and legal journalist. Send tips or comments to [email protected]

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