AMERICAN apparel’s legal battles have taken a weird turn onto the Web.
Facing a string of well-publicized worker lawsuits with charges ranging from sexual harassment to accounting fraud, the trendy retailer appears to be mounting an unusual cyber-counterattack not only against the charges – but also at the lawyer who has butted heads several times with the company’s CEO, Dov Charney.
According to internal e-mails allegedly written by American Apparel staff and obtained by The Post, company officials are buying Web ads and feeding and building sites that allege a litany of malfeasance by the Los Angeles-based lawyer Keith Fink.
In eyebrow-raising suits filed against the company, Fink has charged, among other things, that Charney has conducted business meetings “at his home completely naked.” In response, American Apparel appears to be using the Web to accuse Fink of legal malpractice, defamation and using the media for alleged shakedown tactics.
“Just put bad lawyer in red,” one American Apparel public-relations employee advised a colleague in a Dec. 18 e-mail, when talking about preparing a Google ad.
“I’ll see you in hell,” the same employee joked as he settled on tagging Fink an “extortionist” in another Web posting.
THE company refused to comment on the con tent of the e-mails. “Our position is that those are unauthenticated e-mails,” Joyce Crucillo, American Apparel’s general counsel told The Post Friday. She declined to comment further.
The company has recently begun to hit back at Fink, both in and out of the courtroom.
In a December countersuit against Fink, American Apparel notes that one of his clients was fined for submitting false documents in a bid to squeeze American Apparel for a fat settlement.
That seems mainstream compared to the odd cyber blasts that American Apparel appears to have leveled. “What do you have to do to become the worst attorney in all of LA?” begins a Dec. 16 posting on the Web site keithfinkfiles.com. “Just ask Keith Fink.”
The site was registered privately in order to shield American Apparel and an employee, according to internal e-mails.
Such hardball tactics may be ugly, but whether they’re unethical depends on the case, says Gordon Kaiser, a corporate lawyer with Squire Sanders & Dempsey. “If you’re hiring people to tell lies in public, that’s unethical,” Kaiser says. “But if you believe somebody is out there trying to extort you, there’s nothing wrong with standing up and saying what’s going on.”
Whole Foods CEO John Mackey got into hot water when he started cheerleading for his company and trashing rivals in Internet chat rooms under an assumed name. While American Apparel’s online activity appears similarly clandestine, it’s not as directly related to the company’s finances, Kaiser says.
The day after keithfinkfiles.com was registered, an American Apparel employee expanded the cyber-battle to a popular Web destination, Wikipedia.
He e-mailed a colleague that he had “made” an unflattering entry about Fink on the Web-based encyclopedia.
As of Friday, Fink’s Wikipedia entry began discussing his legal career by noting that he has been sued “multiple times” for extortion and malicious prosecution. “This led to his reputation as an ambulance chaser,” the entry suggested.
Fink is aware of some of the cyber attacks, but told The Post he doesn’t “have time to keep up with it all.”
American Apparel points to the fact that Fink has been fined by courts and sued by clients who have alleged unethical conduct. Fink calls that a “red herring,” saying the court sanctions he has received over his 18-year career reflect his tendency to “zealously advocate for his clients.”
AMERICAN Apparel has been growing more zealous, too. In a Dec. 21 e-mail to Jonny Szymanski – a young blogger who, according to various press reports lived at Charney’s house and who signs his catty posts “Jonny Makeup” – a company official coaches Szymanski on what tone he should take in an upcoming post for the blog “Street Boners.”
“Their [the Web site] tone is pretty harsh – so like when you called Keith Fink a sh***y faggot, that was totally the right fit,” the official wrote, referring to a mid-December posting on the blog by Szymanski that alleged Fink was “blatantly blackmailing” Charney.
While the e-mails reviewed by The Post are mainly communications between members of its PR team, some executives also appear to have contributed to the online guerrilla campaign against Fink.
“Can we make . . . Fink is an Extortionist? . . . Fink is a Liar . . . Fink is an Ambulance chaser . . . I can see the graphics,” one executive writes in an e-mail to a public relations employee, also cc-ing CEO Charney.
“Tshirts??? We can sell them on the blog.”
As of Friday, a Google search of “Keith Fink” first yielded an advertisement titled “Worst Lawyer Ever?” In a Dec. 22 exchange, one of the company’s p.r. officials relays that the ad had been viewed 9,000 times and clicked on by 36 Web surfers.
Unimpressed, the p.r. official mused: “Might need to up the budget.”