Hair-Product Counterfeiter Faces Prison

A Newport Beach man is scheduled to be sentenced today to 16 months in state prison after admitting a scheme to sell up to $1 million of counterfeit John Paul Mitchell hair products, authorities said.

Joseph Frederick Thompson, 33, was charged in 1997 with selling 10 tractor-trailer loads of fake Mitchell-brand shampoo and conditioner to a New York distributor, but fled the country before he could be prosecuted.

“Let’s just say he took an extended vacation in Latin America,” said Joseph Gibbons, Thompson’s attorney.

Thompson turned himself in to prosecutors on March 29 at Los Angeles International Airport. A day later, he pleaded no contest to a counterfeiting charge.

“He realized this was not going away,” Gibbons said. “He’s decided to accept responsibility.”

As part of his plea, Thompson also will pay John Paul Mitchell Systems about $41,500 to cover the expense of storing and destroying the counterfeit products and to offset investigation costs.

Prosecutors said Thompson attempted to duplicate 32-ounce containers of John Paul Mitchell shampoo and two types of conditioner that retail for $12 to $20 a bottle.

The effort was one of the most precise that they have come across--at least to the eye, prosecutors said.

Through a bottle broker, Thompson acquired containers identical to those used by John Paul Mitchell, Los Angeles County Deputy Dist. Atty. William Clark said.

He hired the same company Mitchell uses to apply its logo and bottle design, even giving the products batch codes.

“Most counterfeiters don’t go to that extent,” said Ian Sitren, a Santa Ana private investigator who tracked the bogus products for John Paul Mitchell. “It was the best fake I’ve seen in a long time.”

Thompson and his accomplices sold as many as 60,000 bottles to Quality King, a distributor based in Ronkonkama, N.Y. Sitren said he discovered the counterfeit products in Quality King’s warehouse. None reached customers.

Tests proved the seized products did not match the genuine John Paul Mitchell’s consistency or aroma, Sitren said.

The International Anticounterfeiting Coalition, a Washington group that monitors product fakery, estimates that counterfeiting costs U.S. companies $200 billion a year. Videotapes, watches, software and designer clothes and handbags rank among the most frequently copied products.

Shampoos and conditioners have been targeted before. Head & Shoulders ran an ad campaign to warn consumers about an unauthorized double that hit store shelves in 1995.

“Today, there is virtually no product line that is immune,” said George Abbott, the coalition’s managing director. “Any time a brand is hot, there will also be counterfeiting.”