Mattel Asks for Nearly $2 Billion in Bratz Case

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In closing arguments of the damages phase of the Bratz doll trial, Mattel Inc. asked a jury on Wednesday for more than $1 billion in profits and interest from MGA Entertainment Inc. and nearly as much from the company’s majority owner.

MGA should not be allowed to keep profits from Bratz because the dolls were derived from drawings of a former Mattel employee, Mattel lawyer John Quinn told a federal jury in Riverside, according to Bloomberg News. Mattel also should be awarded $789.5 million in profits that went to MGA’s majority owner and chief executive, Isaac Larian.

The toymaker also asked the jury to award unspecified punitive damages. “No one wanted to license any MGA product until MGA stole Mattel’s confidential information,” Quinn said. “We’re asking you to return MGA to the condition it was in before the theft.”

Mattel’s claims are “Goliath Barbie” trying to “knock down the only competition she’s had in 40 years,” MGA lawyer Thomas Nolan countered during his closing statement on Wednesday.

Jury deliberations were scheduled to start on Thursday.

In the trial’s first phase, the jury found that doll designer Carter Bryant came up with the Bratz name and characters while he worked at El Segundo-based Mattel in 1999 and 2000. Mattel seeks damages for copyright infringement as well as compensatory and punitive damages from Van Nuys-based MGA and Larian for contract interference and for helping Bryant breach his fiduciary duty to Mattel.

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