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IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT IN AND FOR THE MIDDLE DISTRICT OF FLORIDA TAMPA DIVISION NEW YORK YANKEES PARTNERSHIP AND ADIDAS AMERICA, INC., Plaintiffs. vs. . MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL ENTERPRISES, INC.; GREG MURPHY; MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL PROPERTIES, INC.; MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL CANADA, INC.; Defendants. CASE NO. 97-1153-civ-T-25B COMPLAINT PRELIMINARY AND PERMANENT INJUNCTIVE RELIEF REQUESTED JURY TRIAL DEMANDED Plaintiffs New York Yankees Partnership ("Yankees") and adidas America, Inc. ("adidas") for their complaint aver upon personal knowledge as to their own acts and status and upon information and belief as to all other matters: I. Nature of this Action 1. Organized baseball, which according to four justices of the United States Supreme Court began on June 19, 1846 when the New York Nine defeated the Knickerbockers 23 to 1, today consists of 30 major league teams (the "Major League Clubs"). Each of the 30 Major League Clubs are separate, independent businesses with separate, independent owners. 2. Through a series of agreements and understandings, the Major League Clubs work and cooperate together to produce baseball games. However, apart from cooperating together to the extent necessary to produce games, the Clubs compete with each other both on and off the field in ventures both related and unrelated to the exhibition of baseball games. 3. The New York Yankees are, and have long been, the most successful baseball Club in history. Since the Club began playing in 1903, the Yankees have won more games (8,184), more league pennants (34), and more World Series championships (23) than any other Club. 4. At least since the Yankees purchased Babe Ruth from the Boston Red Sox in January 1920, many Clubs have expressed envy and enmity towards the Yankees for their aggressive competitiveness in acquiring players, for their expansive advertising and promotion of the Club, and for the unparalleled competitive success of the New York Yankees both on and off the field-- including in the promotion, development, and licensing of Yankee trademarks. 5. This action arises out of a concerted effort by defendants (in violation of the federal and Florida state antitrust laws, the Florida laws forbidding tortious interference with contracts and misappropriation of trade secrets, and the fiduciary duties owed by defendants to the Yankees) to combine and conspire together to restrain competition in the businesses of the licensing of Club trademarks and of retail and wholesale baseball merchandise sales, and to misappropriate rights and revenues belonging to the Yankees and adidas. 6. For example, the defendants have recently undertaken a concerted effort to interfere with a Florida contract between adidas and the Yankees pursuant to which adidas and the Yankees have agreed that adidas will be a Yankees sponsor, that the Yankees will license Yankee trademarks to adidas, and that the two organizations will cooperate in creating and marketing more competitive merchandise using the Yankees and adidas trademarks. 7. The defendants have also imposed a requirement that Major League Clubs exchange confidential pricing and other competitive data for the purpose and effect of restraining competition in trademark licensing, corporate sponsorships, and retail and wholesale baseball merchandise sales. 8. The defendants also have combined to prevent individual Clubs from marketing merchandise under the individual Club's own trademarks, and to impose sanctions on any Club or licensee that seeks to do so. Defendants seek to prevent the Yankees and adidas from selling merchandise with the Yankees own trademarks in the Yankees own stadium, and to prevent adidas from acquiring the right to use Yankee trademarks in a competitive marketplace. 9. Defendants have combined and agreed not to license their trademarks to adidas or to do business with adidas except on monopolistic terms and conditions. By combining and agreeing to prevent Major League Clubs from competing against one another in licensing of trademarks, defendants have created a horizontal restraint--an agreement among competitors on the way in which they will compete with one another. For example, through the 1995 Agency Agreement, defendants have illegally conspired to establish a horizontal division of markets, the sole purpose of which is to stifle competition among Major League Clubs who might wish to do business with adidas. Defendants' conduct in this respect also has included a group boycott, in concert with Nike and Reebok, and other restraints of trade without legitimate justification. 10. Defendants have also acted to penalize the Yankees for licensing and marketing behavior which defendants characterize as over-aggressive competition, and in general to restrain the competition which they find difficult, uncomfortable, or simply contrary to their narrow self interest. 11. Defendants have also acted to penalize adidas for entering a sponsorship agreement with the Yankees, including threats of litigation against adidas for entering an agreement with the Yankees, and to restrain competition by adidas which they find against their narrow self interest. 12. Defendants' actions to restrict and prevent competition in trademark licensing, corporate sponsorships, and retail and wholesale baseball merchandise sales are unrelated to, and outside the reasonable scope of, any exception the business of baseball may have from the antitrust laws. Moreover, any exemption from the antitrust laws the business of baseball may have cannot justify the defendants' tortious interference with contracts and breach of fiduciary duties. 13. The defendants' actions adversely affect consumers and consumer welfare by limiting consumer choice, increasing the prices consumers pay, and adversely affecting the quality of goods available. 14. Adidas and the Yankees seek damages and injunctive relief for violations of the Sherman Antitrust Act (15 U.S.C. Section 1 et seq.) and for violations of the Florida Antitrust Act of 1980 (Fla Stat. Section 542.15 et seq.). In addition, the Yankees seek damages and injunctive relief for breaches of fiduciary duties under Florida law. In addition, adidas and the Yankees seek damages and injunctive relief for tortious interference with contractual relations under Florida law, misappropriation of trade secrets in violation of the Florida Uniform Trade Secrets Act (Flat Stat. Section 688.001 et seq.), and a declaratory judgment pursuant to 28 U.S.C. Sections 2201-02. 15. Since the Yankees/adidas contract was signed on March 2, 1997, the Yankees and adidas have made repeated attempts to resolve this controversy short of litigation. The Yankees have, at defendants' request, furnished copies of the contract for defendants' review. The Yankees have repeatedly pointed out the antitrust and other legal problems raised by defendants' attempts to restrain competition and to force the Yankees to join in a boycott of adidas, and have asked defendants to reconsider their position (see, e.g., Exhibits 5, 8, and 13, which accompany this Complaint). 16. Rather than reconsider their decision to implement a cartel for the licensing of club trademarks and for retail and wholesale baseball merchandise sales, defendants have reaffirmed their intent to continue and even expand their cartel. Indeed, defendants have required the Yankees and adidas to reveal confidential competitive information to competitors, to require the Yankees and adidas to submit all proposed competitive initiatives (including competitive initiatives permitted by all applicable rules) to a committee composed of competitors of the Yankees at odds with the Yankees, and to pay "severe sanctions" if the Yankees and adidas compete without the committee's prior permission. (See, e.g., Exhibits 7, 15, and 16) 17. Defendants have gone so far as to take the position that, under the threat of severe sanctions, the Yankees and adidas must add a "subservience clause" to their agreement that would provide that at any time the defendants may change the rules so as to invalidate what the Yankees and adidas have agreed (consistent with all existing rules) to do. (See, e.g., Exhibits 15 and 16). Defendants concede that the Yankees/adidas contract is consistent with existing rules. However, defendants take the position that they are free to change the rules at any time, and that the Yankees and adidas must agree that if such a change is inconsistent with their contract that the contract will, to that extent, be invalidated retroactively. The Yankees' compromise proposal that the Yankees and adidas add a "subservience clause" limited to existing rules was rejected. 18. In the last 10 days defendants have further taken the position that the Yankees cannot even sell in the Yankees own stadium t-shirts with the Yankees and adidas' trademarks without defendants' permission. II. The Parties A. Plaintiffs 19. Plaintiff New York Yankees Partnership is an Ohio limited partnership and the owner and operator of the New York Yankees, a member Club of the American League of Professional Baseball Clubs. 20. The Yankees' home field is in New York, New York, and the Yankees maintain executive and administrative offices in New York City and Tampa, Florida. 21. The Yankees Partnership has three general partners, each of whom resides in Tampa, Florida. The Yankees Partnership also operates its Major League spring training facility, its Player Development operations, and two minor league teams (one in the Florida State League and the other in the Gulf Coast League) in the Tampa and St. Petersburg metropolitan area. 22. Plaintiff adidas America, Inc. ("adidas") is a Delaware corporation with its principal place of business in Beaverton, Oregon. 23. Adidas and its affiliated companies are a leading worldwide supplier of sporting goods and apparel. Adidas is the leading supplier of soccer related goods and apparel. Although adidas is not now a leading supplier of baseball goods and apparel it is making a substantial effort to increase its competitiveness in this area, principally through the contract between adidas and the Yankees described herein. B. The Major League Baseball Properties Defendants 24. Defendant Major League Baseball Enterprises, Inc. ("MLB Enterprises") is a New York corporation with its principal place of business in New York, New York. 25. Defendant Greg Murphy is the President of MLB Enterprises. 26. Defendants Major League Baseball Properties, Inc. ("MLB Properties") and Major League Baseball Properties Canada, Inc. ("MLB Properties Canada") are subsidiaries of MLB Enterprises. 27. Defendant Robert Gamgort is the President of MLB Properties and MLB Properties Canada. 28. The defendants identified in paragraphs 24 to 27 are sometimes referred to herein as the "MLB Properties Defendants". C. The Agency Agreement 29. The Yankees, like the 29 other Major League Clubs, possess ownership rights in a series of trademarks and trade names that distinguish the Club from its competition and set products originating from and associated with the Yankees apart in the marketplace. These distinctive marks are sometimes referred to herein as the "Yankees marks". These marks include, but are not limited to, the mark "NY" (stylized letters)(Reg. No. 1,076,665), the mark "NEW YORK" (stylized letters)(Reg. No. 1,677,662), the mark "NEW YORK YANKEES" (Reg. No. 1,073,346), the mark "YANKEES" (Reg. No. 1,571,731), the mark "YANKEES" in script (Reg. No. 1,161,865), and the mark "YANKEES" in script with a bat (Reg. No. 1,542,501). The Yankees' rights in these marks are a significant asset of the Club. 30. On or about January 1, 1984 the Major League Clubs, acting on the insistence of the less successful Clubs, established a cartel to control certain licensing of the marks of all (at that time) 26 Clubs (including the Yankees), as well as the marks of Major League Baseball and its events (such as the silhouetted batter logo and the All- Star Game and World Series marks) and the marks of the American and National Leagues. This cartel was established by the Clubs pursuant to an Agency Agreement signed with MLB Properties, the vehicle created for operation of the cartel. A similar agreement was signed with MLB Properties Canada, further extending the reach of the cartel. 31. The MLB Properties cartel was organized at the behest of a large group of the less successful Major League Clubs. These Clubs induced and coerced successful Clubs, including the Yankees, to participate in the cartel, including threatening the Yankees and other Clubs' existing and future local broadcast contracts, which are essential to the financial livelihood of each Club as sources of Club revenue. 32. To perpetuate the cartel, the less successful Major League Clubs not only coerced Clubs such as the Yankees to join, but imposed a provision enabling a vote of only three-fourths of the Clubs to continue the cartel's existence and even expand its scope. These Clubs also imposed a provision that requires all new Clubs entering the American and National Leagues to join the MLB Properties cartel. The Yankees' efforts to resist the cartel have been unavailing because, as Defendants have stated, they have the votes to act without the consent of the Yankees. 33. The January 1, 1984 Agency Agreement establishing Major League Baseball's retail licensing and sponsorship cartel was later renewed and amended pursuant to an Agency Agreement dated January 1, 1991. The current agreement establishing the cartel is the Amended and Restated Agency Agreement dated December 1, 1995 ("the 1995 Agency Agreement"). The Agency Agreement with MLB Properties Canada has been similarly renewed and amended, and the current agreement extending the cartel to Canada is also dated December 1, 1995. Although the Yankees have not signed these agreements, because more than three fourths of the Major League Clubs have agreed to their terms, defendants take the position that the Yankees are bound to the cartel. 34. Under the 1995 Agency Agreement, MLB Properties is designated as the exclusive agent for the promotional and retail licensing of the marks of the Major League Clubs both in the United States and in international markets. Under the Agreement, the individual Clubs retain only certain rights to license and otherwise exploit their marks within their limited Home Licensing Territory (rights which MLB Properties has repeatedly sought to curtail). 35. MLB Properties has consistently sought the most expansive interpretation of its rights under the Agency Agreement. Most recently, MLB Properties disrupted the contractual relationships between several regional banking institutions and a substantial number of Major League Clubs, including the Yankees, by insisting that "financial card services" are within the ambit of its asserted exclusive agency to license Club logos for "retail products". When the Yankees sought to simply discuss MLB Properties' interpretation of the scope of its agency, MLB Properties once again responded that no discussion was necessary because it "had the votes" to act without the Yankees' consent. 36. MLB Properties' broad interpretation of its rights under the Agency Agreements includes the interpretation that local licensees of the Clubs, and even the Clubs themselves operating in their own stadiums, are required to obtain permission from MLB Properties prior to exploitation of their own marks. 37. To facilitate its goal of operating as the exclusive agent for all 30 Clubs in the broadest possible area, MLB Properties has also dealt harshly with those Clubs who have questioned its role and favorably with those who have supported its monopoly. To this end, MLB Properties has routinely ignored activities which clearly violated its exclusive agency when such activity has been conducted by Clubs supportive of the current cartel (or by players signed to such favored Clubs). On the other hand, Clubs opposed to the cartel, such as the Yankees, have been routinely harassed, received threats from MLB Properties, and have had contracts clearly outside MLB Properties' agency obstructed by the Office of the Commissioner, the Executive Council, and MLB Properties itself. 38. Under the 1995 Agency Agreement, MLB Properties distributes to the Clubs the income from MLB Properties' domestic promotional licensing and retail licensing activities, after subtracting its commissions for such activity (30% of income under $50 million and 15` of income greater than $50 million for each category of licensing) and the fees and expenses it incurs for trademark litigation and sub-agent commissions. MLB Properties also retains for itself all income from international promotional and retail licensing and all income from sources other than promotional and retail licensing. 39. Each Major League Club receives the same share of income distributed by MLB Properties-- despite the fact that the individual value of the Clubs' marks, the Clubs' contributions to the value of their marks, the strength of the Club's individual markets, and the Clubs' efforts to promote themselves and their marks vary widely. 40. The marks of a small number of the larger and more successful Clubs--including the Yankees--account for the great bulk of the income generated each year by MLB Properties. Despite the wide disparity between the contributions made by the marks of these Clubs, each Club receives an identical distribution of the MLB Properties income. 41. As a result of this distribution of income, the operation of MLB Properties deprives the individual Major League Clubs of incentives to promote and protect their own Club's marks. - 42. The cartel hinders efficiency by creating the incentive for free-riding. The equal distribution of revenues from MLB Properties diminishes the incentives for individual Clubs to promote and invest in their marks and in the success of their own Clubs. 43. In the absence of the cartel established and enforced by Major League Baseball through the Agency Agreement and MLB Properties, the Major League Clubs would compete with one another in the markets for professional baseball trademark licensing, sponsorships, and retail and wholesale merchandise--which would in turn lead to more competitive pricing, increased output, improved quality, and greater market efficiency. 44. Perhaps as a result of its retention of all international income from Club marks, MLB Properties has failed to exercise sufficient caution in the protection of the Major League Club marks overseas. In fact, MLB Properties may have, in certain instances, exposed the Major League Clubs, including the Yankees, to potential claims that those Clubs have abandoned their ownership rights in their Club marks. 45. Because of the Yankees' advocacy within Major League Baseball for elimination of the cartel, the Yankees have suffered repeated retaliation from those Clubs supportive of the current cartel, from the Office of the Commissioner, from the Executive Council, and from MLB Properties, all in violation of the antitrust laws and the fiduciary duties owed by such defendants to the Yankees. D. The Interference by Major League Baseball Officials with the adidas Agreement 46. On March 3, 1997 counsel for the Yankees wrote to Defendant Selig regarding anonymous press leaks by Major League Baseball personnel, including personnel from the Office of the Commissioner, extremely critical of the adidas Agreement and clearly designed to create negative publicity regarding the Agreement. 47. The Yankees received a response from counsel for Mr. Selig the next day. Failing to discuss steps taken to investigate the press leaks, such counsel instead insisted that a copy of the adidas Agreement be turned over to the Office of the Commissioner--despite the confidentiality of the adidas Agreement--pursuant to an alleged "long-standing requirement that any significant contract to be entered into by a Club be reviewed" by that Office. 48. The "long standing requirement" referred to guidelines issued by the Office of the Commissioner regarding certain transfers of team ownership rights (typically broadcasting contracts, stadium leases, or loan agreements) referred to by baseball officials as "control interest transfers". Although the regulations purport to grant the Office of the Commissioner the authority to review prior to signing all contracts with a potential duration of five years or longer, in practice this aspect of the Commissioner's review powers have been largely ignored. Indeed, the requirement has keen almost completely ignored for contracts--like the adidas Agreement--clearly unrelated to any plausible change of ownership. Further, there is no provision in the 1995 Agency Agreement requiring submission to or approval by the Executive Council or the Office of the Commissioner. 49. The Yankees offered a proposal designed to assure protection of the contracting parties' proprietary rights while permitting the Acting Commissioner or his counsel to review the Agreement to assure themselves that there was no conflict with Major League rules. 50. After a copy of the adidas Agreement was in fact produced to the Acting Commissioner and his counsel, the Major League Executive Council, convening and acting without the knowledge of George M. Steinbrenner, III (Managing General Partner of the Yankees and a member of the Executive Council appointed from the American League), demanded that a copy of the adidas Agreement be immediately turned over to officials of the Office of the Commissioner and of MLB Properties. 51. Accompanying their demand that the contract be turned over, the Executive Council imposed a $25,000 fine against the Yankees for each day beyond the day after the demand that the adidas Agreement was not produced. 52. In light of the threat of such a steep fine, the Yankees turned over the adidas Agreement the next day. In a letter accompanying the contract, the Yankees reiterated their concerns that they were subjected to Major League approval requirements not imposed on other, more favored, Clubs and sought assurances that the competitively sensitive contract would not be shared with any other team or team owner or, as had been a repeated problem, leaked from the Office of the Commissioner or MLB Properties to the press. 53. The fact of the production of the contract, and the fines threatened by the Executive Council, were in fact immediately leaked to the press by baseball personnel. 54. Despite the Yankees' requests, the members of the Executive Council (again, absent Mr. Steinbrenner) next required--as a condition of the contract's supposed "approval" and despite the fact that each owner on the Council directly competes with the Yankees--that each council member be permitted to individually review the adidas Agreement. 55. Upon review of the adidas Agreement, Defendant Selig and the Executive Council acknowledged that its terms do not violate the Yankees' obligations under Major League Rules or the terms of the 1995 Agency Agreement. 56. Despite this recognition, the Executive Council nevertheless imposed a condition on the adidas Agreement that is wholly unprecedented and completely without a basis in the Major League Agreement, the Major League Rules, or even the 1995 Agency Agreement. Defendant Selig and the Executive Council, citing the undertaking by adidas and the Yankees to "develop projects for their mutual benefit to associate adidas with the Yankees and for the exploitation of that association", required the Yankees and adidas to present any proposed projects for review and approval prior to agreeing to such projects (see Exhibits 15 and 16 attached hereto). The six-member reviewing committee includes the National League President, counsel to the Milwaukee Brewers, the General Counsel of the Office of the Commissioner, the General Counsel of MLB Properties, and Claude Brochu and Jerry Reinsdorf, two owners of competing Major League Clubs who have been particularly aggressive in their personal interrogation of Mr. Steinbrenner regarding the adidas Agreement ("the Special Committee to Limit Competition"). Acting on behalf of Mr. Selig, the Executive Council, and the Special Committee to Limit Competition, counsel for the Milwaukee Brewers emphasized that failure to present projects prior to implementation "will be dealt with in a most severe manner". 57. This requirement of review and approval by the Yankees' competitors, a requirement that even the Control Interest Transfer guidelines do not impose, presents a naked restraint by the Special Committee to Limit Competition, the Executive Council, the Office of the Commissioner, MLB Properties, and the Major League Clubs on the rights of the Yankees and adidas to compete effectively in the market for professional baseball sponsorships and retail licensing relationships. 58. Moreover, the requirement that competitively sensitive information be made available to the Yankees' competitors (and through them to adidas' competitors) itself violates the antitrust laws' prohibition of concerted exchanges of competitive price and other data. Indeed, Defendant Jerry Reinsdorf, who received a copy of the adidas Agreement as a member of both the Executive Council and the Special Committee to Limit Competition, has admitted publicly his intention to use the confidential pricing information contained in the adidas Agreement for the competitive benefit of his Club, the Chicago White Sox. 59. The Major League Club Defendants have acted in an arbitrary and discriminatory manner against the Yankees and adidas, and in violation of the fiduciary duties arising under Florida law from their mutual contracts and agreements with the Yankees, by establishing this unprecedented oversight committee to monitor the Yankees' agreement with adidas. 60. The Yankees have been denied the right to develop, free of the knowledge and consents of its competitors, a relationship with a significant corporate sponsor. Adidas has now been denied the right to associate itself with the most successful team in baseball history. Absent judicial relief, the Yankees and adidas will continue to suffer injury. The acts of the Defendants alleged herein have and, if unabated, will continue to diminish the value of both the Yankees franchise and adidas. 61. Defendants' misconduct is causing irreparable injury to the Yankees and adidas, and unless enjoined, will continue to do so. Plaintiff has no adequate remedy at law with respect to future misconduct by Defendants. E. Anticompetitive Effect and Injury to adidas and the Yankees 62. As a direct, actual, probable, and intended result of defendants' unlawful agreements and conduct, defendants have substantially lessened competition in the professional baseball sponsorship markets and the professional baseball retail licensing markets. Defendants' conduct has the effect of increasing the prices consumers pay in these markets. In addition, output is lower than it would otherwise be and is unresponsive to consumer preferences But for the unlawful restrictions of the cartel, the Yankees and others would offer for sale many sponsorship and retail licensing opportunities to adidas and others not now available in the marketplace. 63. As a direct, actual, probable, and intended result of defendants' conduct, the Yankees, adidas, and others have been denied the right to compete freely in the professional baseball sponsorship markets and the professional baseball retail licensing markets and have been denied profit to which they would otherwise be entitled. The Yankees have been denied profits as the owner of the Yankee marks, as well as the right to enter into efficient and lucrative relationships with adidas and others wishing to associate themselves with the Yankees and to offer products for sale in the consumer marketplace. Adidas has been denied profits from lost sponsorship and retail opportunities with the Yankees and others. The Yankees and adidas have also suffered substantial injury from defendants' efforts to punish and harass them for their opposition to the MLB Properties cartel. Absent judicial relief, the Yankees and adidas will continue to suffer injury through at least November 30, 2000. 64. The MLB Properties cartel has also diminished incentives to create innovative products in the professional baseball sponsorship markets and the professional baseball retail licensing markets, to market and promote the Major League Clubs and their marks nationally, and otherwise to compete vigorously in the professional baseball sponsorship markets and the professional baseball retail licensing markets. 65. The 1995 Agency Agreement, and defendants' continuing conduct, present a significant threat of future injury to the Yankees and adidas in particular and to competition in general. III. Claims for Relief A. Restraint of Trade in Violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Act 66. Plaintiffs incorporate the averments of paragraphs 1 through 152 above. 67. Since at least January 1, 1984 and continuing through the present, defendants have acted in concert with the purposes, intent, and effect of unreasonably restraining trade and commerce. Defendants operate a horizontal cartel, through which the Major League Clubs have agreed not to compete with each other and thereby to fix prices and to reduce output below competitive levels in the (i) professional baseball retail licensing markets and (ii) the professional baseball sponsorship markets. Through MLB Properties, the Agency Agreements and defendants' conduct, defendants have, with only limited exceptions, precluded all competition for the licensing of the Major League Club marks. 68. The intentional and anticompetitive conduct by which defendants have restrained output in the professional baseball retail licensing markets and the professional baseball sponsorship markets is not reasonably necessary to the furtherance of any legitimate, procompetitive goal of Major League Baseball, MLB Properties, the Executive Council, the Special Committee or the Major League Clubs. 69. Defendants' anticompetitive conduct has directly and proximately caused injury and damage to the business and property of the Yankees and adidas, as set forth above. The Yankees and adidas will continue to be so injured unless defendants are enjoined from continuing to engage in the foregoing violations of law. 70. The actual, probable, and intended effects of the foregoing acts and practices, and the continuing course of defendants' anticompetitive conduct, has caused injury to consumers and to competition in the professional baseball retail licensing markets and the professional baseball sponsorship markets as set forth above. 71. Pursuant to Section 16 of the Clayton Act, 15 U.S.C. Section 26, the Yankees and adidas are entitled to an injunction to restrain these violations of the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. Section 1, and to an award of the costs of this action, including reasonable attorneys' fees. 72. Pursuant to Section 4 of the Clayton Act, 15 U.S.C. Section 15, the Yankees and adidas are also entitled to recover treble the damages that they have suffered or will suffer as a result of these violations of the Sherman Act. WHEREFORE, Plaintiffs demand judgment granting to them: (a) the damages sustained as a result of defendants' violations of the Sherman Act in an amount to be determined at trial; (b) a trebling of any and all damages awarded pursuant to 15 U.S.C. Section 15; (c) an award of interest and costs, pursuant to 15 U.S.C. Section 15; (d) an award of reasonable attorneys' fees pursuant to 15 U.S.C. Section 15; (e) an award of preliminary or permanent injunctive relief, pursuant to 15 U.S.C. Section 26, to the degree the Court may deem appropriate; and (f) such other and further relief as this Court deems just and proper. IV. Prayer for Relief WHEREFORE, Plaintiffs demand judgment against Defendants granting to them: (a) Monetary damages sustained as a result of injury due to the Defendants' violations of the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. Section 1, in an amount to be ascertained at trial pursuant to 15 U.S.C. Section 15; (b) Monetary award of treble damages for injury due to the Defendants' violations of the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. Section 1, in an amount to be ascertained at trial pursuant to 15 U.S.C. Section 15; (c) Monetary damages sustained as a result of injury due to the Defendants' violations of the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. Section 2, in an amount to be ascertained at trial pursuant to 15 U.S.C. Section 15; (d) Monetary award of treble damages for injury due to the Defendants' violations of the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. Section 2, in an amount to be ascertained at trial pursuant to 15 U.S.C. Section 15; (e) Monetary damages sustained as a result of Defendants' breach of their fiduciary duties to the Yankees in an amount to be ascertained at trial; (f) Punitive damages sustained as a result of injury due to the Defendants' breach of their fiduciary duty in an amount to be ascertained at trial; (g) Preliminary or permanent injunctive relief, to the degree the Court may deem appropriate, enjoining the Defendants' continuing breach of fiduciary duty; (h) Monetary damages sustained as a result of injuries caused by Defendants' misappropriation of trade secrets in an amount to be ascertained at trial; (r) Punitive damages sustained as a result of Defendants' misappropriation of trade secrets in an amount to be ascertained at trial; (s) Interest to the extent provided by law; (t) All costs, disbursements and expenses incurred by Plaintiff as a result of Defendants' unlawful conduct, including reasonable attorneys' fees; (u) such other and further relief as this Court deems just and proper. IX. Jury Trial Demanded Plaintiffs demand trial by jury of all issues so triable in this cause. DATED this 6th day of May, 1997 Mark Shaughnessy, Atty. The Shaughnessy Law Firm 1200 Fifth Avenue New York, NY 21033 (212) 444-1000 (212) 444-3000 (FAX) and By: Robert E. Hunker, Atty. Hunker and Associates Post Office Box 145151 Tampa, FL 33601 (813) 220-7011 (813) 220-8013 (FAX) |
