Register Suit Alleges Illegal Ad Scheme by 6 Publishers
The publisher of the Orange County Register has sued six publishing companies alleging that they reprinted the Register’s help-wanted advertisements without permission and then billed the advertisers themselves.
The suit filed in Orange County Superior Court on Tuesday by Irvine-based Freedom Newspapers Inc. on behalf of the Register seeks $100,000 in general damages and $1 million in punitive damages.
The action follows by three months a federal lawsuit filed by the U.S. Postal Inspection Service against Professional Opportunity Magazine Inc., one of the defendants in the Register lawsuit.
Postal inspectors won a preliminary injunction against the magazine, but the monthly publication has continued to pirate employment ads and bill the Register’s clients, said Duffern H. Helsing, the newspaper’s lawyer.
“Our customers are complaining and their advertising agencies are complaining, and they want us to do something about it,” Helsing said. “We have a lot of disgruntled advertisers out there.”
Typically, the suit alleges, the defendants reprint an advertisement and, before the Register’s billing cycle churns out an invoice, send a tear-sheet to the advertiser with an invoice or some notice that appears to be a bill.
In big operations especially, such bills can fall through the cracks and get paid with no one the wiser until the Register bill arrives later, according to the suit.
Postal inspectors have said the shopper-like Professional Opportunity Magazine has also pirated ads from the Los Angeles Times, New York Times and Wall Street Journal.
The Los Angeles Times has received complaints from its advertisers about Professional Opportunity Magazine and three other defendants in the Register suit--American Veteran Weekly, Employment Digest and Military Review--said Gordon Lowe, an executive in The Times’ classified advertising department. The newspaper’s legal department is investigating, said Roger Oglesby, a staff lawyer.
The other defendants in the Register suit are International Employment Guide and Worldwide Enterprises Inc., which publishes Employment Weekly Advertiser.
