On 10 March 2020, the Brussels Court of Appeal rendered a favourable judgment in a case regarding the seizure of alleged counterfeit shoes (“beslaginzakenamaak”/“saisie-description”).
The claimant in the seizure proceedings, a shoe manufacturer, had successfully requested the President of the Commercial Court of Brussels to seize shoes sold by a supermarket chain. The supermarket chain opposed the seizure. Based on the arguments presented by the supermarket chain, the President retracted the order granting the seizure. The shoe manufacturer appealed the President’s decision. Our firm represented the parallel importer that had supplied the shoes to the supermarket chain.
In its seizure request, the shoe manufacturer had presented the following evidence: proof of purchase of the shoes, pictures of the shoes, and a unilateral statement by one of its employees stating that internal tests had shown the shoes to be counterfeit. Regarding the proof of purchase and the pictures, the Court decided that they could not constitute evidence of counterfeit, as there were no authenticity markers or pictures of the original shoes to enable a comparison to be made. With regard to the unilateral statement, the Court stated that its content could not be verified on any grounds. Moreover, the shoes in the statement did not correspond exactly with the shoes that were purchased, with the result that it was not possible to rely on the statement. Hence, the evidence presented by the shoe manufacturer was not enough to constitute suspicion of infringement. Therefore, the appeal was rejected.
Please contact Karel Janssens, Jeff Keustermans or Marion Nuytten for general legal advice relating to intellectual property.