Shein argues in a new court filing that there are fundamental flaws in a lawsuit over its sales of unlicensed Selena Quintanilla merch.
In a Thursday (Sept. 17) motion, first obtained and reported by Billboard, the online fast fashion marketplace says a judge should dismiss the legal claims leveled earlier this year by Suzette Quintanilla, the sister of the late Tejano star.
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Suzette, who stewards Selena’s estate via the company Q Productions, alleges in the lawsuit that Shein infringed her sister’s trademarks and name, image and likeness rights by selling T-shirts and other merchandise bearing the singer’s face and classic “Selena” logo in cursive. But Shein argues that these claims are legally baseless.
For one thing, Shein says it removed all the knockoff merch flagged by Q Productions and even implemented a filter that blocks shoppers from searching the terms “Selena” or “Selena Quintanilla.” But even more fundamentally, the company’s lawyers say Shein can’t be held responsible for products it didn’t make.
The e-commerce site sells two categories of clothing: its own Shein-branded items and third-party products from independent merchants. Shein’s attorneys say all the Selena merch at issue in the case comes from this second bucket, and that the law clearly shields marketplaces from liability for hosting third-party goods.
“While Q Productions contends that Shein is directly liable for displaying allegedly infringing third-party product listings in user-generated search results and for facilitating third-party sales, case law confirms that direct liability cannot be imposed on an online marketplace for merely providing a search tool that displays allegedly infringing third-party content in response to user-generated search queries, or for facilitating third-party transactions by processing payments or fulfilling orders,” write Shein’s lawyers from the firm Greenberg Traurig in Thursday’s brief.
Shein’s motion mirrors arguments recently made by fellow budget e-commerce platform Temu in response to similar infringement lawsuits brought by the musical duo Twenty One Pilots and the estate of late British rapper MF Doom. The MF Doom case was settled in June, but Twenty One Pilots is still pursuing claims against Temu.
Selena’s estate did not immediately return a request for comment on Friday (Sept. 18). Attorneys for Q Productions will likely respond in writing soon to Shein’s motion to dismiss their lawsuit, which is set for a judicial hearing in late October.
It’s a busy moment for the Selena estate lawyers. In addition to the ongoing Shein lawsuit, Suzette and Q Productions were sued last week by Selena’s brother, A.B. Quintanilla III, for allegedly underpaying his share of the profits from the late singer’s music. Suzette and her mother, Marcella Quintanilla, have called these “false accusations.”
