Blazi v. Wagoner [1]

The owner of a Connecticut coffee shop sued two former employees in federal court, asserting that they violated federal and state law when they allegedly converted the coffee shop's website into a forum to launch verbal attacks on the store and its owner. In his complaint [2], John A. Blazi, the owner of Greenwich Coffee, LLC, accused Jason Wagoner and Nicolas DeGrazia of trademark infringement, violating state and federal unfair competition laws, false representation, violating the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, and conspiracy.

In the complaint, Blazi accused the defendants of using GreenwichCoffee.com, the coffee shop's former website, as a "web-based campaign of discrediting the store" in hopes of running it out of business. Compl. [2] ¶ 17. The domain name, although initially used for official Greenwich Coffee business, was registered solely in Wagoner's name without Blazi's permission, according to the complaint. Compl. [2] ¶ 12. 

The defendants denied [3] the allegations and filed a motion to dismiss [4] the suit on the grounds that the plaintiff had filed an almost identical suit in Connecticut state court. The plaintiff objected [5] to the motion on the grounds that Blazi was not the plaintiff in the state lawsuit, the state complaint named an additional defendant, and the federal claims were not included in the state suit.  The United States District Court for the District of Connecticut granted [6] the motion to dismiss the federal suit Feb. 4, 2009. The court stated its main reasons for its ruling were the presence of identical underlying facts in both cases, the state court's ability to apply federal law to the other lawsuit, and inconvenience to the defendants.

Greenwich Coffee, LLC v. DeGrazia, the suit in state court, has yet to be resolved, according to the Connecticut Judicial Branch's website [7].