United States Sixth Circuit

In a trademark and trade dress infringement suit filed against a toy company by GMC involving a series of toy vehicles resembling GMC's Hummer, summary judgment for GMC is affirmed where: 1) despite the district court's failure to adequately discuss the Frisch factors, summary judgment was appropriate on the trademark infringement claim due to the weight of the factors in favor of a finding a likelihood of confusion; 2) GMC established that there were no material issues of fact as to any of the three elements of trade dress infringement; and 3) denial of summary judgment on laches and estoppel defenses was proper.

Appellate Information

• Decided 10/25/2006
• Published 10/25/2006

Judges

• Before: MARTIN and RYAN, Circuit Judges;  MARBLEY, District Judge.

Court

• United States Sixth Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellees:
  
• ARGUED:  John A. West, Greenebaum Doll & McDonald, Cincinnati, OH, for Appellants.  Mark A. Cantor, Brooks & Kushman, Southfield, MI, David R. Pruitt, Baker & Daniels, South Bend, IN, for Appellees.   ON BRIEF:  John A. West, Greenebaum Doll & McDonald, Cincinnati, OH, William T. Robinson III, Carrie Anne Shufflebarger, Greenebaum Doll & McDonald, Covington, KY, for Appellants.  Mark A. Cantor, Marc Lorelli, Brooks & Kushman, Southfield, MI, David R. Pruitt, Edward A. Sullivan, Gerard T. Gallagher, Baker & Daniels, South Bend, IN, for Appellees.