Commonwealth of Massachusetts v. Busa

COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS v. BUSA  |  Docket No. 1101cr005277  |  Boston Muni. Ct. Centr. Div. May 21, 2012  |  The Cyberlaw Clinic prepared this amicus brief (pdf) on behalf of the Digital Media Law Project in a case that involved a prosecution under Massachusetts’s anti-counterfeiting law, M.G.L. ch. 266 § 147 (“Section 147”).  Section 147 punishes one who willfully “manufactures, uses, displays, advertises, distributes, offers for sale, sells or possesses with intent to sell or distribute any item or services bearing or identified by a counterfeit mark,” and it defines “counterfeit mark” to include “any unauthorized freproduction or copy of intellectual property.”  The brief argued that Section 147’s definition of counterfeit mark — with no requirement that the mark be likely to cause confusion — criminalizes speech protected by the First Amendment and is thus unconstitutional.