monahan identified himself as a chief brand officer for ghostbed when he spoke
at a content and commerce summit in September of 2016
upon information and belief ghostbed has intentionally induced directed
encouraged approved or authorized HMR and Monahan to make the false and
misleading statements on the blog and HMR and Monahan have acted as agents of
ghostbed with respect to the conduct alleged herein hmm hello everyone I'm
Leonard French your favorite copyright attorney and a lot of you have been
white powder thing ...that went viral ------ this week now the case is actually from February 2017
But its a little bit more complicated than i think either party is really letting on and
this case is a great example when both party just kind of really just go at it
as hard as they can .. it it not pretty
its not pretty
when ... oh well ... let me show you its not pretty
this is the is the ---- starting on the Feb 24, 2017 the complaint was ---- on Feb 27
restraining order was denied another restraining order was signed then
there's some opposition to the restraining order lots of attorneys
enter their appearances people make affidavits in support of their positions
the temporary restraining order is eventually dismissed after a hearing
these are all memorandums in opposition to things somewhere in here a motion for
contempt is filed allegedly based on someone using a poop emoji I'm not sure
if that's 100% accurate or up to 60 documents filed and it's one month into
the case a motion for dismissed to dismiss is filed another motion to
dismiss is filed motions for extension of time opposite
- the motion for extension of time motions to seal documents opposition's
to motions to seal documents responses some of the documents get
sealed this is nuts people this is absolutely
nuts can you imagine being an attorney in this case and trying to keep track of
all of this this is absolutely nuts so let's take a look at some of these
documents and honestly I may turn this into more of a longer episodic series
because this case is just nuts so the original complaint let's bring
that up here the original complaint purple innovations versus honest reviews
Ryan Monahan and ghostbed complaint with a demand for a jury trial introduction
this case involves false and misleading statements disseminated across the
internet about purple innovations by a primary competitor defendant ghostbed
including specific statements that ghostbed had previously agreed to remove
from its website and various social media platforms now however those and
other false and misleading statements are being hosted on a new created
mattress industry related blog honest mattress reviews which purports to be
honest but is anything but specifically defendants honest mattress reviews and
Ryan Monahan has begun a groundless campaign against purple which has
enjoyed recent and rapid success in the bed in a box mattress market and is
quickly overtaking ghost bed as an industry leader upon information and
belief ghost bed where Monahan is or recently was employed is participating
in or sponsoring the campaign as well as substantially benefiting from the
campaign so it appears that the allegation is very much that ghost bed
the competitor is behind this when I saw the video I was thinking that honest
mattress reviews was some small YouTube review channel of thing that reviews
mattresses if this is true because these are all
allegations by the plaintiff by purple innovations by purple mattress if these
if this is true then it sounds like maybe there's more to this maybe there's
a competitor involved here the campaign launched by defendants includes numerous
false and misleading statements about purple and its product and services
including without limitation false allegations related regarding the safety
of Purple's mattresses that reported lack of adequate safety testing and
Purple's alleged deception of its customers in this regard many statements
go so far as to imply Purple's mattresses are dangerous and can lead to
serious disease or death these statements are false and unfounded and
defendants provide no basis or evidence to support any such statements more
troubling HMR makes a number of purported disclaimers on the blog which
are false and misleading among other things HMR and Monahan purport to be
independent and unaffiliated with any particular mattress company such that
there are review reviews are without bias but they fail to disclose that
Monahan has or had in the past very close ties to ghost bed which as noted
is one of Purple's main competitors the evidence establishes a reasonable belief
that HMR Monaghan and/or other entities owned or controlled by Monahan are
directly or indirectly and surreptitiously working with ghost bed
to make false and misleading statements effect that are specifically designed to
promote ghost beds products over those of purple and other manufacturers and
that in return ghost bed is compensating HMR monahan or
other related entities and in this way engaging in and attempting to conceal
conduct defendants know to be illegal in recent months purple became aware of a
new mattress review website honest mattress reviews calm which purports to
be honest and unbiased starting in January 2017 purple discovered that the
HMR blog had begun posting false information regarding purple and its
products including posts calling into question the safety of purple bed
products over the course of just a few weeks the blog has made five posts
regarding purple which are predominantly displayed on the blog and are
misleadingly represe as articles and/or breaking news these
posts directly attacked purple and its products making both literally false
statements and statements that are highly likely to mislead consumers the
articles are titled as follows what exactly is that white powder on Purple's
mattress a deeper investigation into purple mattress and pillows white powder
PSA due to Purple's unknown powder we're revoking our endorsement Purple's
acknowledgement of the white powder still misleads consumers mattress
reviewers have a responsibility to acknowledge consumer safety the overall
message of the articles posted by defendants is clear
Purple's mattresses are unsafe the message however is demonstrably false
and unsupported by any evidence HMR has chosen to ignore both publicly available
safety information regarding Purple's products and the lack of any information
to suggest that Purple's products are unsafe instead defendants have
intentionally elected to launch an unfounded campaign of false and
misleading statements and innuendos against purple and its products they
then appear to go through the individual allegations in each of the articles or
posts depending upon your perspective purple mattress has released as says
that they've released some kind of a statement explaining that it is not a
talc powder but it is a chemically inactive inert food grade material that
is non-toxic and harmless and that it's powder is innovative and proprietary and
they don't want to reveal the contents of how they made it well okay that that
doesn't really answer anybody's question though I mean if you were just told this
powder is safe trust us you'd want to ask more questions so I
get why people believe that this powder could possibly be unsafe I'm not saying
it's unsafe I don't know a gosh darn thing about the powder but if I was
going to be laying on a mattress that's made with it I can understand why people
would want to understand what they could possibly breathe so asking
I think is totally cool is honest mattress reviews Ryan Monaghan and ghost
bed taking advantage of the question and the lack of a open and transparent
answer and is that an unfair competitive advantage that we're going to have to
see in the court case causes of action okay so we're finally on page 56
discussing what causes of action so first Lanham Act false advertising
the Lanham Act is the trademark law defendants are making in commerce
numerous false and misleading descriptions and statements of fact
regarding purple and it's goods and services second cause of action tortious
interference with economic relations defendants have intentionally interfered
with Purple's existing and prospective economic relations including without
limitation its customers repeat customers and potential customers third
cause of action basic defamation defendants have made and continue to
make numerous Express and imply false misleading and material statements
about purple not subject to privileged published with negligence purple has
been damaged fourth cause of action trade libel injurious falsehood
defendants have made numerous Express and implied material statements they are
false temporary restraining order they're asking for a restraining order
to have the articles taken down they claim to be suffering irreparable harm
including but not limited to injury to goodwill business market position etc so
that's the original freakin complaint and that already took a crapload of time
to go through let's jump a little bit here let's compare the new amended
complaint to the original complaint and see what's changed here's a section
they've added Monahan identified himself as a chief brand officer for ghostbed
when he spoke at a content and commerce summit in September of 2016
Monahan made a post to Facebook about a tragic occurrence involving a
ghostbed employee who had been severely injured in his post Monahan describes
himself as a member of her current and former work family in late 2016 in
connection with a review of a ghostbed product on Amazon a customer emailed
Monahan who responded by email on behalf of ghostbed and listed his title as
ghost beds chief brand officer Monahan is listed as the contact for a contest
in which a veteran could try and enter to win a free ghostbed mattress with the
email address of Ryan at ghostbed comm and instructions to mail requests for
the list of winners to ghost bed business address attention Ryan Monahan
in a case filed in federal court in Florida by ghostbed nature's sleep and a
related company against Casper sleep and others ghostbed Monahan HMR and social
media sharks a company owned by Monahan are represented by the same well-heeled
New York City law firm Carleton fields Jordan Burt including Ethan Horowitz of
that firm who now represents ghostbed in this case moreover in papers that ghost
bed and HMR have filed in this case they have admitted to a current connection
between Monaghan and ghost bed stating that Monaghan is the CEO of social media
sharks an entity that contracts with another entity named achieve agency for
purposes of providing marketing services to ghostbed upon information and belief
ghostbed has intentionally induced directed encouraged approved or
authorized HMR and Monahan to make the false and misleading statements on the
blog and HMR and Monahan have acted as agents of ghost bed with respect to the
conduct alleged herein hmm ghost bed is listed as one of the very highest rated
mattresses on the HMR blog appearing as the third entry on a lengthy list of
companies on the reviews tab the only other mattress companies that have
received similarly high rankings are either not participants in the bed in a
box market or they are small players and pose no threat to ghost bed the two
companies listed before ghost bed are a $4,700 mattress from tempur-pedic
which is not in the bed in the Box segment and is not price competitive and
a $1,200 mattress from nest which although is part of the bed in the box
market is not price competitive and has not yet even been reviewed on the blog
but nevertheless received a world-class ranking besides ghost bed and nest which
has not even been reviewed yet none of the other players in the bet in the bed
in a box market are given the world-class rating on the blog in fact
the next competitor that poses any threat to ghost bed is Casper which is
ranked far down 19th on the list Purple's mattress which was 29th on the
list is the only product that at the time of the case was filed had received
a poor rating on the list depicted through the use of a poison suggesting
red X during the period from when the case was filed to the present no mention
has been made anywhere online of HMR and Monaghan's association with ghost bed
after the case was filed but before the t ro was entered defendants posted a new
article entitled purple mattress launches massive lawsuit to silence
honest consumers safety questions including numerous false and misleading
statements and then it goes on to cite many of the new things that HMR has put
on their website consumers have asked questions that are quite related to the
false and misleading statements on the blog making references to the product
being toxic lawsuits toxic chemicals etc a new claim for contributory false
Association and false advertising and now civil conspiracy beginning in late
2016 or early 17 a combination of two or more persons was formed including but
not limited to Monahan HMR and ghost bed this combination had an object to be
accomplished including the smear campaign against one of ghost beds
biggest competitors purple sentence engaged in one or more unlawful overt
acts and furtherance of the object that set for them at preceding causes of
action eighth cause of action Utah truth in advertising Act and then continues to
ask for a restraining order an injunction that's a lot and I think
I'm going to stop there and I have a lot more research to do but
this is enough for a first video and I think I want to make this an episodic
series this I think was a good introduction to some of what's been
going on and answer some of the questions and we'll go from there so
thank you for joining me I'd love to hear your thoughts and concerns in the
comments below what do you think so far are you on somebody's side are you with
me that is we're just good to stop and just sort of wait maybe crack open a
bottle of soda and maybe some popcorn or something and just kind of watch this
one maybe we don't judge too much until we've seen everything that's happened
I'll be back with another one of these videos in maybe a week or two I've got
some catching up to do I know I owe you a bunch of new videos and to expect
those to come about every other day for the next well foreseeable future because
I have taken steps to to dedicate more time to making videos and for that I
want to thank my supporters who are donating money to the patreon including
Joshua Mike Seeger Jon Crips Josh Barnard and a new $50 level supporter
back sorne who has pledged and will begin their there their support in in
June so thank you very much to all of those supporters as well as the $5
supporters which are listed in the description and scrolling on the LED
panel behind me I really appreciate everything you guys are doing for me
you're allowed you've really made this whole thing possible
you've really validated my existence as a human person and I really appreciate
the two-way street that this that this community has become as because it's
growing is becoming is just amazing so thank you so very much for all of that
my name is Leonard French I'm your favorite copyright attorney you guys
have a good day good evening good sleep whatever you're about to do and I'll see
you very shortly in another video
onions have made numerous Express and implied material statements they are
false this violates some law about that