Montpelier man accused of 'cybersquatting'
Toolbox
By Peter Crabtree Rutland Herald - Published: April 20, 2005
MANCHESTER — The Vermont Country Store has gone to court to prevent a Las Vegas “cybersquatter” who used to live in Montpelier from operating Web sites with names similar to its own.
A U.S. District Court judge ordered Michael E. Nelson last month to stop using trademarks belonging to the Vermont company or its law firm until the legal dispute is resolved.
Judge J. Garvan Murtha also directed Nelson not to contact some of the principals involved or their family members, whom he is alleged to have threatened.
Nelson has used the name Montpelier Vermont Country Store on a Web site he runs from Nevada, according to the Vermont Country Store complaint.
When the Manchester-based retailer asked him to stop, Nelson allegedly responded with “an aggressive cybersquatting campaign” in which he registered several other Internet addresses with similar names.
He also launched Web sites bearing the names of the company’s law firm, Gravel and Shea of Burlington, and its attorneys. Nelson meant to intimidate and defame them, according to the complaint.
The legal firm represents many Vermont businesses, including the Rutland Herald.
Nelson allegedly offered to sell the Vermont Country Store and Gravel and Shea at least 14 domain names in return for a “ransom” of $14,655.
“Nelson maintains Web sites that include links intended to deceive and divert traffic to his sites, to harm Vermont Country Store’s business and extort money,” according to the complaint.
The store said Nelson is a self-described “Internet guru” who owns and operates several Web sites offering design services, auto parts and products for ice rinks.
He once attended Norwich University. The school obtained a restraining order banning him from campus in 2001. He was also prohibited from contacting a dozen college employees, according to Washington Superior Court documents.
A former Montpelier resident, Nelson said in an interview he ran for mayor in 2002. He left Vermont for California that year and moved to Nevada the next, he told the court.
Vermont Country Store became aware of Nelson’s alleged trademark infringement in January when searching the Web to find similar sites, a routine practice for the company.
Nelson allegedly responded to Vermont Country Store’s concern by leaving threatening voice messages at the Manchester headquarters.
Nelson has denied the accusations. In documents filed with the federal court, he said Vermont Country Store’s complaint was “riddled with untruths, half truths and blatant lies.”
Nelson said he had canceled the domain name registrations for eight of the sites in question. That was meant as a goodwill gesture, he wrote.
Meanwhile, he alleged that a Vermont Country Store executive had made bizarre telephone calls to his elderly mother.
Nelson also asked the court for more time to prepare his case. He wrote that in addition to running his business and mounting a legal defense, he was trying to “stay sane (and) get occasional naps.”
The Vermont Country Store complaint originally named a business associate of Nelson’s, Alan Goldman, as a defendant. He registered the name Montpelier Vermont Country Store with the Vermont secretary of state’s office last year with thoughts of eventually opening a “bricks-and-mortar” store in the capital. The company later agreed to dismiss him from the complaint.
“My client never had a business,” attorney David Putter said of Goldman on Tuesday. “He never made a sale.”
Founded in 1946, Vermont Country Store in Manchester employs about 600 people during the peak holiday season. In addition to its catalog business, it has retail stores in Weston and Rockingham.
Neither Nelson nor Vermont Country Store executives William Shouldice IV or Randy Kruml returned telephone messages Tuesday. Gravel and Shea attorney Andrew Manitsky could not be reached.
Contact Peter Crabtree at peter.crabtree@rutlandherald.com.
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