Source: Why Is The Mormon Church Suing John Dehlin?
Channel: Mormon Discussion Inc.
Published: April 25, 2026 | Archived: April 26, 2026
Video: Why Is The Mormon Church Suing John Dehlin?
Channel: Mormon Discussion Inc.
Published: April 25, 2026
Duration: 1:39:58
Views: 11,441
Category: Nonprofits & Activism
Video ID: 48YU3VS4xDg
Description
An attorney looks at the complaint! What is up with the Mormon Church? Why are they suing John Dehlin? Radio Free Mormon uses his 36-year career as an attorney to review and dissect the Church's complaint, and discovers a number of fascinating elements to what the Mormon Church may really be up to! If you want to know what's going on with this lawsuit, there is no better place to turn than Radio Free Mormon! [RFM 455]
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Transcript — YouTube panel (human-authored)
0:02 Radio Free Mormon here broadcasting behind enemy lines. Tonight's episode number 455. Why is the church serving John Delin? Good evening everybody and welcome to the Radio Free Mormon show. As you may have heard, if you're not hiding under a rock, the Mormon church is suing John the Lynn. The allegations are trademark and copyright infringement. They filed this suit about a week ago.
0:38 Everybody's been talking about it. And today I'm going to take a look at it as an attorney. A licensed attorney. Yes, still licensed. Thank you, Tyler. Go Lightly in Haiti, Nick. Still licensed in Washington State. Still a licensed attorney. And I'm going to be taking a look at the church's complaint against John Glenn because experience has told me that that is the place to start in order to understand any legal case whether criminal or civil. You need to start live deep original complaint.
1:17 And that's what we're going to do here tonight. And I'm going to turn off that music and get it out of the way. So, welcome to the show. Now, as an attorney for many, many years now, 36 years. The first eight years I was a prosecutor. The rest a defense attorney and as a private defense attorney, I get the opportunity to talk to a lot of people who were charged with crimes because they're calling around. They're trying to find somebody to represent them and they frequently call me.
1:44 Now, my experience has been that when a person is charged with something, the first thing they want to talk about to an attorney or probably anybody else, but to an attorney is why it is that they're not guilty of what it is they're charged with. And the problem is is that if they start explaining why it is they're not guilty, then that doesn't make a lot of sense unless I know first what it is they're charged with. In other words, their defense makes no sense unless I know what it is they're defending against. And frequently people calling up attorneys or me at least want to skip that step. So I took to making it a regular practice when I'm talking usually on the phone with people who are charged with crimes of asking them at the outset, what is it you are charged with? What crimes are you charged with?
2:37 so that their story thereafter would hopefully make a little more sense because I know where it's going. I know what it's leading up to. Now, frequently when I did that, people would skip the step anyway and jump into why it is they're not guilty. And I would have to bring them back and say, "Okay, what is it you're charged with? I'm not saying that the charge is correct." Okay? I'm not saying that there's merit to it. I'm not saying you're guilty of it, but I need to know what it is before I can understand your defense. And so that's why today we're going to go to the complaint and we're going to read the complaint and I'm going to make some comments about it because I don't understand everything about this case by far yet. But I am getting my arms around the complaint that the church has filed against John Delin and I'm starting to see some things in it that make me question what is going on and what is the church really after. Here is the
3:33 thumbnail for today's show, RFM number 455. It's called Lawsuit. Why is the Mormon church suing John Delin? And there's a number of slides here that we'll go through after we go through the complaint, but I want to show you that I've got a couple of different uh things going here with a slide deck as well as with the complaint itself. And here is the complaint up here on the stage. And the complaint says as follows. First off, there's all the lawyers who are representing the church up there in the upper left. Oh, there's more. My gosh, they've got so many. They have three attorneys from Texas, Austin, Texas, Bookamors, who are going to be representing the church. Prohack Vichi, which just means that they're from Texas. They're not licensed to practice in Utah. But a prohack vichi is this idea that with the permission of the court which is generally granted for a specific case a person from out of state or out of the jurisdiction may come in with permission of the court on
4:39 a specific case for good reason to enter a notice of appearance even though these attorneys are not otherwise licensed to practice in the state of Utah. So that is what that means as far as I can recall from law school. Never done it myself. So, these are the attorneys for Intellectual Property Reserve, Inc. and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Once again, Intellectual Property Reserve, Inc. is one of the many, many companies that the church owns. And this one owns the intellectual property. So, it is a sub company of the main company, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. And these attorneys are representing both of them because it is a lawsuit about trademark and intellectual property. It is titled complaint for trademark infringement and copyright infringement and jury demanded. There was a lot of conversation about the jury demanded and what that means. Uh some people were speculating, well, it's in Utah, so they definitely want a jury full of Utah
5:39 Mormons that would favor them. Uh I don't know if that's the case, but the jury demanded part is just boilerplate and it's put in pretty much every kind of complaint. They don't have to end up with a jury. This is a civil case. So, it's not like a criminal case where a jury is constitutionally mandated and has to be expressly, knowingly, intelligently waved by the defendant before he does not get tried by a jury and only by a judge. It's kind of the opposite or at least different in civil law. There's no constitutional right in a civil case. You have to demand a jury.
6:13 And if you don't demand a jury, then later on, if you change your mind and you want a jury, maybe you won't get it. So you got to demand it at the outset. That's what they're doing here. It's all pretty much standard. And the names of the parties are Intellectual Reserve, Inc. and the Mormon Church versus Open Stories Foundation and John Delin, an individual. So here we go. Plaintiffs. And when it says plaintiffs, that's the intellectual reserve and the Mormon church by and through their council hereby complain and allege against defendants open stories foundation and John Pedalin as follows. The introduction now the introduction is going to be very standard. I'm not going to spend a lot of time on this. It talks about uh the defendants open stories foundation and John Lynn operate a podcast under the name and mark Mormon stories. That word mark is like a trademark. Those are the marks they're talking about. As defendants are well aware, the public
7:10 associates the term Mormon with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Well, that's interesting. I suppose they do in spite of the church's best efforts for the past 10 years under President Nelson's administration when he made it very clear in a wasn't it a conference talk that um using the term Mormon for Mormon church is a major victory for Satan and they have taken all these steps to su the use of the word Mormon in the LDS church and to get away from it and get away get back to the original name of the church the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Anybody who lived through that knows what I'm talking about. That happened for a decade where not only was the LDS church not going after John Delin or not enforcing its rights to trademark violation, if that's what they're claiming is going on, they slept on their rights for a number of years with John Delin. But it's not just that. It's
8:08 that they also affirmatively disclaimed use of the term Mormon. In many situations, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, the name had to be changed to the Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square. No Mormon. They changed all of the um the addresses, the email addresses for everybody works for the church, as I recall, to make it church of Christ, right? instead of LDS, not that uh terrible little um acronym. It had to be the Church of Jesus Christ. That was important. Very important. So, they don't want Mormon for 10 years, but now they want Mormon, and they're going to sue John Delin for using the term Mormon. Now, there's going to be a number of other elements to this lawsuit. In other words, it's not just going to say, "Hey, we want John Delin to stop using the word Mormon." It's going to be that plus a host of other things.
9:07 The colors, um, the background, there's a light ray kind of, um, uh, symbol or usage. Um, there's a lot of things that they're going to be talking about. The thing is this is that everything that they've been talking about in this complaint, except for the term Mormon really, I think, has already been complied with by John Dyn. These negotiations, the mediation started in November of 2025. It's now April of 2026 when the lawsuit was filed. I'm recording this on April 24th of 2026. It should air on the 25th of April, this podcast, but this has been going on now for half a year. And the church in John Delin with his attorneys have been meeting and going through mediation and talking about the things the church wants John Delin to do. And John Delin has been doing several of them. He changed the color, remember, of his logo. It used to be a blue that looked a lot like the church's blue. Um, if you can have your own color, but the church the blue that the
10:11 church uses um and has for many years. John Delins has that same kind of blue. changed it to orange. Um there's the light ray issue which is a background and you'll see what it is here in this complaint and John Delin has taken that out. So he's done everything that the church wants him to do. It seems oh the church wants him to do a disclaimer. This will be an important point. The church wants him to do a disclaimer. He has done disclaimers but apparently they weren't good enough for the church. but he's done disclaimers and all of this prior to the church filing their lawsuit against him.
10:52 So if John Delin has complied with all of these different demands of the church, demands that show up in the lawsuit, even though he's complied with them, which itself is a bit sketchy, and I don't think the judge is going to be impressed when he finds out when John Delin files his answer that actually almost all of the things that they're complaining about John Dyn doing as part of their complaint, he's already complied with prior to the time they filed their complaint. I don't think that's going to impress a judge. But the point I'm trying to drive at is that when you look at all the things that John Delin has complied with, he has complied with pretty much everything except taking the name Mormon out of Mormon stories. So if that's the only thing that John has not complied with of the demands from the church, the only main thing, the primary thing, right, and the church is still filing a lawsuit against him, one might conclude that really it is the use of the name Mormon
11:48 that is the primary motivator in the mediation, which failed. John complied with all these other things, but he didn't change it from Mormon stories to something else. So if the church files a lawsuit after John has complied with all these other things, it might lead one to conclude that that is the main reason the church filed the lawsuit in the first place and everything else was kind of window dressing.
12:10 Okay, going back to this complaint, as defendants are well aware, the public associates the term Mormon with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which has used the mark Mormon and other names and marks. Yeah. incorporating the term Mormon since its founding nearly 200 years ago. Now, as you might expect, this complaint is not going to acknowledge the truth of the matter that for the past 10 years, the church has distanced itself from the use of the term Mormon. In fact, it has told its members not to use the term Mormon when referring to the membership of the church or the name of the church. That's not going to appear in here anywhere. It will be in the um the filings from John Delin and Open Stories obviously, but it is not in the complaint going on.
12:59 Defendants use of church trademarks and copyrighted materials as caused and will continue to cause individuals to be confused and access defendants content mistakenly believing it comes from or is affiliated with or endorsed by the church. So, in simple language, what they're alleging is is that John's uh labeling looks so similar to the churches that people will go to his podcast thinking it's authorized by the church when it is not.
13:30 They go on, this is not by accident. The Fendance adopted a blue Mormon stories logo with a light raised design. There's the light raised design. We'll talk about that here in a second. prominently used by the church showing defendants intent to capitalize on and increase confusion. Defendants logo was calculated to imitate the church's logos by using confusingly similar color, font, and other design elements as shown below.
14:04 So, here in the complaint itself, they have a row of logos, which uh are all apparently church logos, except for the one in the middle, which has the red box around it. And they've lined all of these up in order to show how it is that the Mormon Stories logo looks so much like these other symbols and logos that the church has. Now, you will notice that not only is the color blue, and we'll get to this here in a second, but they have the light rays image in it.
14:34 And that is something you can see in these other Mormon, like the one on the left with uh Jesus on it. You can see it's not just Jesus against the blue background, but there's these rays of light in the upper left hand corner and above Jesus. And those are light rays. And this is part of the logo that the church owns. and has registered as a trademark, this light rays motif. And if you look at these other logos from the church, you can see the light rays in there as well. It's not something I had really specifically noticed before, but now I see that they're trying to imitate light rays. And if you look at the Mormon Stories logo in the middle, not only is it blue, not only does it have the word Mormon before stories, but look at the bottom. It looks like there's sort of some light rays which are similar to though not completely identical to the light rays design that the church uses and that's significant
15:30 for the church's complaint. Now, let me go to this other slide deck that I have which has the thumbnail for today's show, RFM lawsuit. And let's go to the first slide because somebody out there made a collection of different logos that the church uses, which don't use the color blue, but in fact use a color different than blue. So, on the complaint, the church lines up all of its blue logos as if sort of that's all the logos the church uses and it's always blue. Well, it's not always blue, apparently. So, they weren't showing all the logos, just the ones that were blue.
16:07 And here we have a bunch of logos from the church in different apps and different places that are red, green, uh, yellow, orange, purple, all sorts of different ones. And there's 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 logos here of colors different than blue. But over here we have 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 eight logos which are blue. I'm not including the Mormon stories in this counting, just the ones from the church.
16:38 So, eight blue logos that the church has are put next to Mormon stories and no mention or inclusion of the 14 non-blue logos that the church has are put up here in order to give the impression and perhaps a somewhat false impression, I might add, that all the logos the church uses are blue, thereby making Mormon stories use of the color blue uh more egregious. Apparently, I expect that this discrepancy will be made manifest in the filings from open stories as well. Number two, when the church approached defendants about their infringement of the church's intellectual property rights, i.e. the mediation they had, they agreed to make some changes, which they did. They changed the color of the font and um they did a number of other things and we're going to get to those here in just a second, but ultimately would not agree to take basic actions necessary to lessen the confusion caused by defendants infringements.
17:38 For example, Defend Dance refused to include a simple statement, either verbal or written, at the beginning of podcast episodes, acknowledging that Mormon Stories is not affiliated with the church. Now, here in the complaint, they are going to be more specific than they were in the statement that the church released about having filed the complaint, which we will also get to here in a second. This is going to be a very important paragraph in this complaint because it has to do with a requested disclaimer. The church requests that John Delin puts a disclaimer on his show that we don't have anything to do with the the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
18:20 They may as well say the Mormon Church now since apparently it is acceptable. But a disclaimer, and the reason this is important is because John Delin and Mormon Stories did put a disclaimer on their descriptions of their shows, their various shows, and not just one, but all over the place. And they put these disclaimers up in response to the church's request that they put up a disclaimer. This is what they did. Let me go back to this slide deck once more.
18:56 and show you first off what it is that the church said in their statement they released called getting it right clarifying trademark and branding concerns. If we go to what I think is the most important segment of this release I'm not going to read the whole thing. It's available at the church website. Why was mediation unsuccessful is the question they ask and which they're going to answer now. The primary issue the church says the primary issue is ongoing confusion about whether Mormon stories is affiliated with the church and I think that's a largely manufactured confusion on the part of the church but that's what they're alleging it's what they have to allege in order to prevail to address that the church proposed a simple solution so now they're talking the church is talking about what the church asked for of John Dyn in mediation This is what they asked for. To address that, the church proposed a simple solution. A brief disclaimer that the podcast is not affiliated with
20:01 or endorsed by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Now, John Delin did that and he did it all over the place and I'm going to show you some examples of that here in a second. But it's important to remember and realize this is what the church is saying in their statement. Lots of people are going to read the statement. A lot fewer people are going to actually read the complaint because it's 30 pages and it's legal stuff, right? It's much easier just to take your cues from what the church says about it rather than reading the complaint. But what they're saying is the simple solution they wanted John Delin to adopt in order to make it so nobody would think that he was affiliated with the church is to give a brief disclaimer. Notice it doesn't say where in this statement that the church released. It doesn't say anything about the disclaimer except it would be brief and that John Delin refused to do it. That gives a false impression.
20:57 This is deceptive on the part of the church and intentionally so. This language is very carefully chosen. It's a carefully worded denial. They're denying that John Delin agreed to this. A brief disclaimer is all they wanted that the podcast is not affiliated with or endorsed by the church. Now the reality appears to be and if we go by the complaint and what John Delin said, they wanted a disclaimer at the beginning of every show either verbal or written and that is something that is different than just saying a brief disclaimer that the podcast is not affiliated with the Mormon church. Right? So why are they not putting that detail here in their statement that they released about the lawsuit they had filed? Because if they told the truth, it wouldn't make John Delin look as bad as they want him to look. And it might make the church not look as good as they want it to look.
21:54 Because apparently the truth is they wanted a disclaimer. They wanted at the beginning of the show. John Delin says, "I don't want at the beginning of the show." That's crazy. I'm not going to put a disclaimer at the beginning of every show that I'm not endorsed by you. But what I will do is I'll put a disclaimer on all my channels that uh are in the show descriptions that everybody can see that there is no affiliation. And here are some examples of what it is that John Delin put up.
22:20 But before I get to those disclaimers that John Delin did put up, let me finish this section of the church statement. To address that, the church proposed a simple solution. A brief disclaimer that the podcast is not affiliated with or endorsed by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. This is a common and straightforward way to help audiences understand the source of content. That step was not adopted. But you see, the way they phrase it is they're saying John Delin wasn't willing to adopt any kind of disclaimer, even a brief disclaimer that is commonly used in order to reduce confusion. Right?
22:59 That's the impression they're leaving the audience with, which has had the effect of unleashing a great deal of anger and animosity at John Dyn. Because what the church is saying is he is a pirate. He is flying under a false flag. He is trying to imitate the church. and he refuses to even give a disclaimer of any sort, a brief disclaimer otherwise unspecified in this statement by the church that he is not affiliated with the Mormon church and therefore giving the impression to others that John Delin is attempting to deceive people into believing that his podcast actually is endorsed by the church. And of course, the irony is just made all the richer by the fact that it is the church that is deceiving people by this statement and the way it's worded. And John Delin is not deceiving anybody. He's put up these disclaimers all over the place. The final thing the church says in the statement is that step was not adopted.
23:59 As a result, the likelihood of confusion remains and the church moved forward to protect its trademarks. Which is kind of a strange way of putting it, isn't it? In other words, because John Delin doesn't put up a disclaimer, the church is moving forward to protect its trademarks, there's almost a disconnect there. Instead of saying they move forward to force John Delin to put up a disclaimer, now they're going to protect their trademarks, which leaves the impression, though I don't think it's a correct one. It leaves the impression that if John Delin had put up a disclaimer, then the church would have been fine with his using and continuing to use their trademarked images.
24:40 I don't think that's making a lot of sense. And it especially doesn't make a lot of sense when John Delin has already complied with the majority of their demands in that regard except for removing the word Mormon. More and more what this whole thing looks about is a distraction campaign by the church to make John Dyn look like a bad guy for not putting up disclaimers when really really the thing the church is aiming for is the word Mormon and to make John Dyn stop using it. Now, why might the church try and make it look like it's about trademarks and disclaimers when really it's about the word Mormon? Well, after the church has spent 10 years under President Nelson's administration, distancing itself from the word Mormon and claiming that the word Mormon is a porative of sorts. Some Mormons have said it's like the n-word when you call a Mormon a Mormon. Right? It's gone that far. And I think people who watch the show have known that and probably encountered people like that. For the
25:38 past 10 years, if you have called any member of the church a Mormon, nine times out of 10, the response is going to be, "No, I'm not a Mormon. I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints." Well, now they want Mormon back. And that puts them in a bit of an awkward position. So, I think it makes sense that they don't want to focus on it's the Mormon that we're really interested in and try and make it all about these other trademarks and disclaimers. But the fact that John Delin has complied with most of these trademark requests prior to the lawsuit being filed, put disclaimers on all of his platforms as a result of the mediation before this lawsuit was filed.
26:16 and the fact that the church is going after him for disclaimers that he's already put up or perhaps they didn't like the way they put him up or they wanted him to put them at the beginning of each show, which is what the complaint indicates, but the statement does not. That makes sense to me because they don't want the public to see that it's really about the term Mormon after they have been distancing itself from the term Mormon and even calling it a victory for Satan. Yes, I know it's a major victory for Satan, for crying out loud. Why are the church's lawyers trying to protect a term that has been labeled for the past 10 years by the LDS church itself as a victory for Satan?
26:58 Yeah, bad optics. Let's focus over here instead and see if we can get people to look at the bright shiny thing called the disclaimer. That is part of what I sense may be going on. And here are some of those disclaimers on the Mormon Stories podcast. They have a bunch of different platforms. I'm not exactly sure which platforms each of these are from, but you can see this is the Mormon Stories podcast. At the bottom in yellow is the disclaimer that John Delin put up in response to mediation.
27:27 Mormon Stories is a product of the Open Stories Foundation, a 501c3 nonprofit dedicated to supporting Mormons in religious transition. Mormon Stories is not affiliated with, endorsed, or sponsored by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. So, there's the disclaimer right there for that platform. Here's another platform, Mormon Stories Podcast. This looks like it could be Facebook. Mormon Stories Podcast by Dr. John Delin is the longestr running podcast in Mormonism.
27:57 Mormon Stories is brought to you by the Open Stories Foundation and is not affiliated with, endorsed, or sponsored by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. So, there's the disclaimer on a second platform. Here's another one. Open Stories Foundation. All rights reserved. Mormon Stories is not affiliated with, endorsed, or sponsored by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Here's another one at the very bottom. Mormon Stories is not affiliated with, endorsed, or sponsored by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. So the disclaimers are everywhere on all the Mormon stories platforms, but this is not good enough for the church. They want something more. They want something unusual. They want apparently John Delin to say at the very beginning of every episode this language that we're not affiliated with the LDS church and they don't sponsor us. Yeah, I think that's over the top.
28:50 I'm not sure that I've ever seen that happen before. But then again, I also have to give you the caveat that I took the trademarks and copyright class in law school and I came this close to failing it. I think I got about a 61 or a 62. So that's just by way of caveat enter. I think I understand a few things about the law that I didn't when I went to law school and took that class back in the 1980s. But nevertheless, you have been warned. But with or without law school, I can tell a disclaimer when I see one. And I can see that there are several of them that John Delin has put up in response to mediation. But that is all before the church files its lawsuit and before the church releases its statement about the lawsuit. And in the church's statement about the lawsuit, remember after John has put up all these disclaimers, it says to address that the church proposed a simple solution, a brief disclaimer that the podcast is not affiliated with or endorsed by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day
29:49 Saints. Well, John Delin did that in spades, but they filed a lawsuit anyway. So, actually, they want something other than what they're saying here. Now, one of the problems is is that a lot of people out there don't know that John De put up the disclaimers in response to mediation and they think that what the church here is saying is strictly true. They are being deceived by the church and that is exactly what the church wants them to be by this statement is deceived. There are the disclaimers.
30:18 Now, here's a person who was deceived. Her name is Jasmine Rapley, and she was deceived by the church's statement. And so, she put up a podcast that's called the unreasonable demand that got Mormon stories sued. Well, the unreasonable demand that she's talking about was they refused to put up a disclaimer. But he had put up a disclaimer. He put up multiple disclaimers. And so she's trying to say John Delin is a bad guy because he doesn't want people to know that Mormon Stories is not affiliated with the church because he won't put up a disclaimer when he already has. You see, this is how the church manipulates people and it manipulates its own apologists and podcast influencers like Jasmine Rapolley by giving a false and deceptive statement about what's going on. She picks it up and runs with it and slams John Delin for being a no- good so- and so who's trying to fool people into thinking that his podcast is associated with the Mormon church and he
31:16 won't do the simple and reasonable request of putting up a disclaimer. Here's one from Latter Daily Saints. And you have a picture of John Delin, which is AI generated, I believe, a picture of Jesus. That's the logo of Jesus and the Mormon story symbol. And this guy up here who is talking about John Delin and says, "Does this expose his real intentions?" LDS church sues Mormon stories for not complying with this simple demand. You see, they're falling for it, too. These people are being deceived by the church that they are paid to defend. And that is wrong of the church to do that because when these people find out that the church has not been straight with them, that's going to cause some kind of cognitive dissonance.
32:04 That is not going to be appreciated by the people who are deceived into thinking that John would not put up any disclaimers when actually he had. And then they come out publicly and they pounce upon John Delin and they excoriate him all under the false pretenses that the church itself has created. So let's go back to that lawsuit and once again go to this very important paragraph. Paragraph number two.
32:32 When the church approached defendants about their infringement of the church's intellectual property rights, they agreed to make some changes, which they did, and lots of them. but ultimately would not agree to take basic actions necessary to lessen the confusion caused by defendants infringements. For example, is this really just an example or is this the main thing? For example, defendants refused to include a simple statement either verbal or written at the beginning of podcast episodes. So here in the complaint, they say with more clarity and detail what it is they intentionally obscured in the church statement they released because it says defendants refused to include a simple statement either verbal or written at the beginning of podcast episodes plural all of them right acknowledging that Mormon stories is not affiliated with the church. This is the main place where the church is caught being deceptive. This is what the lawsuit's about. You saw what the
33:32 statement is. You see the reaction to the statement which is visceral and anger against John Delin for trying to be so deceptive when actually that's not the case at all. It is the Mormon church as usual who is the one who is being deceptive here. Going on with paragraph 2. And while defendants assured the church they would remove the church's copyrighted images from their website and social media pages and would not use copyright images in the future. By the way, they did remove them. They didn't just assure them that they would remove them. They did remove them and took steps to remove them. And we'll talk about what some of those are. It's like using copyrighted pictures and thumbnails. Just a few days later, Defend Dance used a copyrighted image of a church temple to advertise a podcast episode. And that may have happened. I'm not exactly sure about the specifics, but it sounds like something that was probably unintentional, a mistake, an oversight rather than a deliberate giving the church the finger. after
34:30 having agreed not to use any of the church's copyrighted images. All right. The church does not seek, paragraph three, the church does not seek in any way to influence the content of defendants podcast just to drive them into bankruptcy so they'll go out of business and can't podcast at all. I added that part. But defendants should not be allowed to use the church's trademarks or other church intellectual property to cause confusion as to the source, affiliation, connection, endorsement, or authorization of defendants podcast and other content.
35:03 In order to fulfill its religious mission, the church must ensure its millions of members and others seeking information about the church can identify, recognize, and trust materials created or authorized by the church and distinguish them from information provided by other sources. Given the confusion caused by defendants's persistent use of the church's intellectual property, plaintiffs filed this complaint to prevent defendants's use of trademarks likely to cause confusion to the public. Now, let me read the statement again because once again, you have to remember that John Delin has already changed all the trademarks at the request of the church prior to their filing this lawsuit and using this language against John Delin. it. He changed it from blue to orange. And orange is like the opposite color from blue. At least I think it's opposite from blue on the color wheel. You can't get a color
35:59 that's more different from blue than orange. And John Delin went with orange. He used to have light rays in his logo like the church does, but not identical, but similar to those are gone now. So, he took those things out. He has taken out all the copyrighted images from thumbnails of podcasts past. To my understanding, he has done that. And so, he's done everything that the church asked him to do with regard to these trademarks except for the use of the word Mormon. And yet, notice the language that the church uses as if he hasn't done bupcus about any of these trademark issues or copyright issues.
36:39 Here's what they said. Given the confusion caused by defendants's persistent use of the church's intellectual property, plaintiffs file this complaint to prevent defendants's use of trademarks likely to cause confusion to the public. Well, is that really what this complaint is about when John Delin has already taken care of the lion share of that? That's my question. Or is this more smokeokc screen coming from the church about its true motives?
37:04 Plaintiffs also seek to prevent defendants from using church-owned copyrighted works in promoting or advertising their business or content, which contributes to the confusion. Now, we're going to have a section that's called the parties. We know who the parties are. We don't need to know where they are located. Nature of action and jurisdiction. That's also something that's usually not that interesting for purposes of what we're after. Now, we get to the facts.
37:29 This is where the rubber hits the road as far as the allegations being made by the church and their complaint. Number one, plaintiffs trademarks and copyrights. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a worldwide faith founded in the United States in 1830. Since its founding, the church's membership has grown to over 17 million members with over 30,000 congregations in more than 160 countries and territories worldwide and nearly 7 million members and over 14,000 congregations in the United States.
37:58 Plaintists have continuously used in commerce marks incorporating the term Mormon for nearly 200 years. Specifically, the church uses the marks Mormon. Really? Do you? I thought you had specifically not been doing that for 10 years. But they go on Book of Mormon. That I can understand. Book of Mormon stories. Apparently, they've got a a podcast or a website with the Book of Mormon stories for kids. Mormon messages. Mormon channel. Really? Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Now, hang on just a second. Now, I know now I know that you're playing fast and loose with the facts. I know that the Mormon Tabernacle Choir hasn't been called the Mormon Tabernacle Choir for years because the prophet of God, the president of the church, the president of the corporation said, "We're changing the name." And he said why it is we're doing it because we don't want to use the word Mormon anymore. Book of Mormon Videos, Mormon Battalion, Mormon Handcraft or Mormon Handiccraft, and others collectively
39:00 called the Mormon Marks. So this is their list of things they're calling Mormon marks because they use the word Mormon in them in connection with the church's religious, humanitarian, genealogical, historical, educational, and broadcasting services as well as written and audiovisisual materials such as podcasts, videos, digital materials, instructional materials, books, photos, paintings, and music and a wide variety of other related goods and services. By the way, when I know that the church is fudging on Mormon tabernacle choir because they say that the church uses the marks Mormon tabernacle choir. No, they don't. Present tense. I know that for a fact. It also makes me doubt whether the church is being upfront about its allegations of these other marks that include the term Mormon. I know Book of Mormon they still use, but the rest I have a big question mark about. Planiff's use of the mark Book of
39:52 Mormon stories includes among others use and connection with podcast videos and audio recordings in the field of history and religion. Their kids stories. It goes on plaintiff's use of the Mark Book of Mormon stories includes use and connection with podcast videos and audio recordings in the field of history and religion. Now, I think these are podcasts and videos for kids. It's like Book of Mormon stories that my teacher tells to me. That kind of Book of Mormon stories. They're going to spend a little bit of time especially on this one because Book of Mormon stories includes the phrase Mormon stories. I think that's why they're pointing this one out. Especially and John Delin has Mormon stories. Well, we've got Book of Mormon stories. Therefore, uh uh uh that's too close to what we have. Mr.
40:35 Delin going on because the church and its members hold the Book of Mormon as a sacred companion text of scripture together with the Bible. The term Mormon has been strongly associated with the church and its members since the church's founding. Well, that's true, but are you going to tell us about the last 10 years when President Nelson has been saying don't use the term Mormon?
40:55 Spoiler alert, they're not going to mention that at all going on. For example, although the official name of the church is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the public has long referred to and recognized the church as the Mormon Church and its members as Mormons. What about the last 10 years? I guess they didn't happen, did they? Consequently, the Mormon marks have been the subject of extensive publicity. The public continues to associate the Mormon marks with the church. H do they really? Maybe the public does, but do the members.
41:30 Okay. Plaintiffs Mormon marks share the inherent distinctive term Mormon as a common characteristic. Plaintiff's Mormon marks are and have long been used and promoted to except for the past 10 years. Come on guys, be honest. Can you does it hurt? Pliff's Mormon marks are and have long been used and promoted together, including in connection with related goods and services. When used with such goods and services, the relevant public recognizes the Mormon marks as referencing the church and as an indication of origin. Thus, the Mormon marks constitute a family of marks. Now, in spite of the fact that they're fudging on the facts here, all right, they're saying this because they have to establish that they have an ownership interest in the Mormon mark. In other words, that the public recognizes Mormon as exclusively or largely or primarily something that comes from the LDS church or associates it with the LD LDS church
42:23 such that when they see a podcast called Mormon Stories that they're going to be believing incorrectly that this is also associated with the LDS church. That's the point they're trying to make and it is noteworthy that they have to ignore a number of very salient and pertinent facts in order to make that point. Once again, the blanks will be filled in by the filings from John Delin and Open Stories. I expect since at least as early as May 2016, plaintiffs, that's the LDS church, have broadly and prominently used in commerce a distinctive light rays design. So here we get to the light rays design. The black and white registered version is shown below in various colors they use it even though it's the black and white version that's shown below and orientations. In other words, different places within a square or within a circle. They're going to call this the light rays design marks. And let me go down here and show you what that is.
43:19 Okay, so they have it at the bottom of this paragraph. This is what the light rays design marks look like. And apparently they have these trademarked as well. There's a segment where they show that. So, this has been trademarked by the church. And it does look like up here where we had the row of different logos. Here we go. You can see over here at the left, you can see there's Jesus on the logo with the blue circle. And there's the light rays logo behind him.
43:50 And you can see it over here on the next one. And the one that's marked Book of Mormon. It's a little bit fainter, but it's still present. Over here, the one with the arrow. You can see the light rays. And here in Mormon stories, you can see light rays. Now, it's not exactly the same. It is a simplified version of those light rays, but it is similar to, though not identical with the other light rays that show on the Mormon trademarks. And you can see those light rays going to the right of the Mormon story circle in these other logos that are put up here. Now once again, John Delin, to my understanding, remove the light rays, change the color of the logo. So none of these things are really at issue anymore. And yet, the church is making it sound that way in its complaint, as if he hasn't already complied in this regard. Going back to paragraph 20 on the complaint talking about the light raised design marks
44:45 which the church has used since 2016 in connection with the church's religious humanitarian genealological educational and all these other kinds of different usages. You can read them. There's a long list. While plaintiffs use the light raised design marks in various colors and orientations, plaintiffs registration for the light raised design mark shown below is in black and white and covers all colors and orientations of the light raised design mark. So there it is again going on to paragraph 21. Since April 2020, plaintiffs have also broadly and prominently used the symbol shown directly below. This is going to be their Christrista statue, new Jesus logo, which at its center features a churchcom commissioned representation of Burle Torvaldson's marble Christrista statue, the Christrista symbol is what they're calling it on or in connection with the church's religious humanitarian and there's that long list again,
45:41 reasons of why it is that they use this particular logo. While plaintiffs use the Christrista symbol in various colors, plaintiffs registration for the Christrista symbol is in black and white and covers all colors of the logo. So there is that logo which we have all come to know and love. Now some of you are going to wonder like I did when I was reading through this, what does this have to do with John Delin and Mormon stories? Here's the church logo. He's not using that. Well, apparently there are times when he has used this logo in thumbnail designs and this is really what it is that they are complaining about here. Now, if you remember, I saw this used in a thumbnail design, this very logo not that long ago. And let me show you what I mean because here we have the slide deck, right? Remember this one from Latter Daily Saints?
46:34 And here is the thumbnail that they have with John Delin and his Mormon Stories logo. You can see it's now orange. It now does not have the light rays. But what's this over here on the left? My gosh, they're using the church's logo in their thumbnail just the same way that they are complaining about John Delin having used it. So I wonder if the church is going to be seeking action against Latter-day Saints for this breach the same way that they are against John Delin. Time will tell on that. Going back to the complaint here, they're saying that they are including the Mormon marks, the light rays design marks, and the Christa symbol.
47:12 Basically, everything they've talked about up to this point in the complaint are collectively referred to as plaintiffs marks, their trademarks. The Christa symbol is used as the church's official visual identifier, including for official media, literature, news, and events of the church. The Christa symbol has become widely associated with the church as its primary visual identifier.
47:36 Is that true? I don't know if that's true. Has the Christa symbol really become that widely associated with the church as its primary visual identifier? It's not the the Salt Lake Temple or anything like that. It's not the angel Moroni really. Okay. I don't know if they'd be able to prove that, but they're going to assert it anyway. It may be true. I don't know. I just kind of doubt it. Paragraph 23. Plaintiffs widely use the light rays design marks to designate and identify the church's official materials and offerings including but not limited to across the church's official websites and social media etc. and all these other places they're talking about where they use the libraries design marks. They're used in a variety of colors but most often in a distinctive blue color and frequently with the Christa symbol. Two examples of the many such usages or uses of the light rays design marks on official church websites, YouTube, and social media pages are displayed directly
48:32 below. Okay, so here's a couple of examples. On the left, you got the Christa statue. You can see those light rays designs very clearly there. And over here on the right, you've got # greater love and Jesus getting friendly with the sheep. And over here on the right of that, yeah, there's the light rays in purple. I got it. I can see those. 24. Additional examples of such uses by Plus of the Light Rays design marks in connection with official church logos and icons are also displayed directly below. Okay, so here they're going back to those logos that we went back to earlier and showing all the light rays in all the different logos.
49:08 Once again, they're only including those blue logos, but we can see the light rays distinctively here. And once again, why are they making such a big deal about this when John Delin has already removed the light rays from his logo? I wonder. Pliff's marks are inherently distinctive, serving to identify and indicate the source of the church's goods and services to the consuming public and to distinguish the church's goods and services from those of others.
49:38 As a result of the church's long and extensive use and promotion of plaintiff's marks, those marks are distinctive and designate the church, distinguish the church and its goods and services from the goods and services of others and distinguish the source or origin of the church's goods and services. The church has invested significant effort and resources in advertising and promoting plaintiff's marks and the goods and services offered under or in connection with those marks.
50:06 As a result of the church's efforts, the general consuming public throughout the United States widely recognizes and associates plaintiff marks with the church and the church's goods and services. Really, the light rays? I hardly even noticed the light rays before this lawsuit. I really doubt that people throughout the United States or anywhere else for that matter widely I don't think the members of the church widely recognize and associate the light rays march with the church and the church's good and services. The church has established significant and valuable goodwill and consumer recognition in plainiff's marks. As a result of the church's long use and extensive promotion of the plaintiff's marks, the church has acquired valuable common law rights in plaintiffs marks throughout the United States. In addition to these extensive common law rights in the Mormon marks, the Christy symbol and light raised design marks, pliff intellectual reserve, Inc. owns many US
51:04 trademark registrations for certain of Planiff's marks covering a wide array of goods and services, including at least the following. And here is the mark Mormon which they have trademarked. And there's the number over there on the left, the US registration number of the trademark and the purposes for which it is used over here in the right. Now it's only for these purposes. I'm not going to go and read all the different purposes. You can read those if you like. There's a lot of duplication there. Though there may be some significance to the goods or services descriptions for which they have these marks trademarked. But they do have the word Mormon trademarked for certain purposes. They have Book of Mormon trademarked for certain purposes. And once again, they have another Book of Mormon trademark for additional purposes. Book of Mormon stories is trademarked by the church for certain purposes. Book of Mormon stories again and again are trademarked for additional
52:01 purposes as apparently they were produced. Mormon messages is trademarked by the church. Mormon Channel trademarked by the church. Mormon Tabernacle Choir trademarked by the church. But once again, we know that they haven't been using that. And it's not just a case once again of simply ceasing to use something. It's a case of affirmatively discounting and dismissing and rejecting and abandoning their trademark of Mormon Tabernacle Choir because of the use of the term Mormon, which I think is going to be at the center of this particular lawsuit.
52:38 Here's a few more. There's the Mormon Tabernacle Choir with the symbol that they used to have of the um the Oregon pipes. Book of Mormon videos is another trademark. Mormon Battalion, Mormon Handiccraft. There's the light rays. We can see that again. And uh there's a number of purposes for the light rays over there in the description section. Here's the Christristus statue in the logo, which has a US registration number, which by the way is 6 million 974,951.
53:11 Almost 7 million is the registration number there. Each registration listed in the chart above is valid and subsisting. And there they list a number of those numbers of the registration numbers that have achieved incontestable status. And such registrations constitute conclusive evidence of the validity of the registered mark and of the registration of the marks of the registrants's ownership of the marks and of the registrants's exclusive right to use the registered marks in commerce. I mean this is what trademark law is about, right? You come up with the trademark and you're the one who gets to use it exclusively. Nobody else gets to use it. And if they start trying to, then you can bring a lawsuit to enjoin them from using it. And then the question becomes, how close is too close, right? That's where this is going to end up. It's also going to be a question of how long has John Delin been using Mormon stories without the church
54:06 moving against him in order to protect their trademark. They've had a trademark to Mormon this whole time. Why hasn't the church moved against him before? Now, this is going to be another issue before the judge. Has the church slept on its rights? It obviously has for 20 years since John Dyn started Mormon Stories. They can't say that John Delin we didn't know about it because he was over here in a corner and we couldn't see him from where we were. And if we had seen him, we would have done something about it. No, because Mormon stories has been a thorn in the side of the LDS church for a long time. Remember those bubbles, that chart they had at the Mormon leadership meeting that got leaked many years ago, the enemies of the church and John Delin had his own bubble with his name on it. Yeah, they've known about John Delin and Mormon stories for a long time. They exccommunicated the man 10 years ago for crying out loud. They can't say they didn't know about Mormon stories. So,
55:02 they don't have that defense to why it is they didn't do anything about this trademark infringement before now because if you sleep on your rights for 20 years knowingly and you don't move against someone who's obviously infringing on your trademark and now you say 20 years later, hey, that guy's been infringing on my trademark. We want it to stop. And the law looks at the church and says, so why didn't you do something about this before now if it was so important? And the church says, "Um, I don't know what the church is going to say to that question. They're not going to address it here. They're going to have to address it at some point." And once again, I'm going through this in some detail, this complaint, because this lawsuit looks like it's going to be a story that's going to be around a while and it's going to develop. There's going to be a lot of permutations. There going to be responses filed and arguments made. There may ultimately be
55:57 a trial. And it behooves those of us who are interested in the story and want to understand it as it unfolds to get on board at the very beginning and understand what the initial complaint is that the church is making. Which is why I'm taking the time to do this this evening going on. Plaintiffs also own valid copyright. So this is not trademark. This is copyright in the images shown directly below. And in exhibit two, by the way, none of the exhibits are in this particular version of the complaint. So, we don't have those, but we do have the images that they included within the body of the complaint. Among others, consistent with these rights, plaintiffs have registered the copyrighted church images with the US copyright office. That's in exhibit 2. Includes the copyrighted church images, the copyright registration numbers for those works, and examples of defendants. That's John Delin's infringing uses of those works which is
56:53 discussed further below. Exhibit 3 contains true and correct copies of the copyright registration and renewal certificates or certificate previews for these registrations that are available to plaintiffs at the time of filing this complaint. And here are a bunch of the images that the church says it is copyrighted. I have no reason to disbelieve them though with the church you always got to double check. But this is their allegation and it looks like it would make sense that they would have these copyrighted. So here's a picture of Jesus, a painting. Here's a photo of Jesus from the movie. Here's the Christrist Jesus. Here's Russell M.
57:28 Nelson. It looks kind of AI, but maybe it's really he. And over here is a person who's talking to a congregation. Here's uh this looks like it's got to be John the Baptist because he's given the ironic priesthood to Joseph Smith. Here's the Salt Lake Temple under reconstruction. And what they're going to be complaining about, I believe, is the use of these copyrighted images in thumbnails that were used at Mormon Stories. And once again, my understanding is is that these have been removed in response to the request from the church. Oh, here's a couple more.
57:59 Here's a ceiling room. And over here, it looks like the Oakland Temple. So, apparently these were used in thumbnails as well. Section two, defendants unlawful conduct. Now, that's John Delin and Open Stories. Defendants provide a religious themed podcast and related offerings under the name and mark Mormon Stories. According to the Mormon Stories website, John P. Delin began the Mormon Stories podcast in 2005. That's a fact that they gritted their teeth when they put in there because they know that's 20 years ago and they know this is going to be one of the uphill challenges they're going to face in bringing this lawsuit.
58:35 Later, Dyn formed the nonprofit corporation Open Stories Foundation in 2010. The purpose of forming the entity was to advance the mission of Mormon Stories podcast. Mormon Stories has used a brown Mormon Stories logo in both round and square formats as shown below. The Brown Mormon Stories logo in connection with its business, including on its website and other online platforms. Now, I don't think they use these anymore. So, why are they bringing this up? Well, they're bringing it up because they want to throw everything they can at the wall and hope something will stick. Once again, I don't know how a judge is going to feel when he finds out, he or she finds out that actually these were long since discontinued. Yes, they were used by Mormon stories, but they've long since been discontinued. So why are you including them Mormon church in your lawsuit against John Delin to make him stop using these? You know what I mean?
59:30 I think this is going to be a big surprise to the judge when they find out that a lot of this stuff is history, ancient history, and doesn't actually represent what's happening. As of the time the lawsuit was filed in or around December 2022, Mormon Stories began using the blue Mormon Stories logo shown below. So that's four years ago, according to them. This blue Mormon stories logo includes a light raised design that imitates the church's light raised design marks and is highly similar to the church's logos and icons.
1:00:04 And there they have a picture of the former symbol or logo of Mormon stories. You can see it's blue. You can see the font is similar. Though I understand that font cannot be trademarked or copyrighted. I don't know if that's true. I heard it from someone who is in a position to know. But yeah, you can see the um the light rays there at the bottom that imitate the church's light rays. I'm not sure what the thought process was in doing that, but you know, at this point on this issue, I think the church kind of has a point, although it's been changed now, so it's a point that no longer has any place in this lawsuit, but they put it in anyway. 35.
1:00:42 Defendants also use or have used other logos featuring the Mark Mormon stories, including the orange logo shown below. This is their new one. Right now, this is interesting because what they're doing is they're taking two discontinued logos, the brown or tan one or gold one with those light streams coming in, those light rays, and the blue one with the light rays. And both of those have been discontinued. And yet they're acting as if all three of these are currently being used by Mormon stories. I think that's a wee bit deceptive. Defendants also use or have used other logos featuring the Mark Mormon Stories, including the orange logo shown below. Okay, so let's look at this from another point of view, shall we? Even though we know that this is the orange one is the only one that they're using now. No light rays in the orange one. You'll notice nothing to complain about there. can't complain about the
1:01:39 blue. What is the common denominator between the gold symbols with Mormon stories and the light rays, the blue symbol with Mormon stories and the light rays, and the orange symbol with Mormon stories and no light rays? I'll tell you what the common denominator is. It's the word Mormon. It's the only common denominator between the three. And we know that the other two have already been discontinued as part of mediation.
1:02:10 So why is the church filing this lawsuit again? Is it really about John Delin's refusal to put a disclaimer on his show, which he's done in multiple places, or is it about this word Mormon right there? That's my question. defendants. Mormon stories word mark and logos including the brown Mormon stories logo, the blue Mormon stories logo, the orange Mormon stories logo, and all other variations of the Mormon stories mark and logos used by defendant are referred to collectively herein as the defendants marks. Now, why don't you just refer to the one that they're using now as the defendants's mark? Because they want to include the others to try and make their case look better. Once again, I think when the facts get told to the judge that he hasn't been using the other two and he discontinued using the other two because of mediation with the church, I think this is going to backfire on the church a bit because it looks like they're being deceptive to the court because they are kind of Mormon Stories
1:03:10 provides the Mormon Stories podcast in video and audio format. Podcast is available on the Mormon Stories website at mormontories.org, or the Mormon Stories YouTube page at uh that address and other online platforms. And there they list them and they state a screenshot of the Mormon Stories website as it appeared before plaintiffs pointed out defendants infringements is attached as exhibit 4. So they are specifically going to the point before they started having the mediation, before the church pointed out the infringement and before John Delin changed them. At least they're saying that that's the case here in exhibit 4, which we don't have because we don't have any of the exhibits. But the screenshot of the Mormon Stories website was before mediation. It is now obviously been changed.
1:04:03 Mormon Stories also promotes and provides the Mormon Stories podcast and content to consumers on Mormon Stories social media pages on Facebook, Instagram, and Tik Tok among others. And they also offer podcasts featuring the Mark Mormon, including in connection with the Mormon Stories podcast, such as Mormon Matters and Mormon Mental Health. Yeah. Mormon Stories has also intentionally and willfully reproduced and displayed without permission or license identical or substantially similar copies of copyrighted images owned and previously registered by the church on the Mormon Stories website, YouTube page, and other social media pages to promote the Mormon Stories business and podcast as shown in the examples directly below. Okay. Now, here we get a couple of these examples, right? So there's the copyrighted church image from above of President Nelson.
1:04:53 And here's where they're showing that John Delin and Open Stories use that same image in a thumbnail for Mormon stories. This can be problematic definitely. And my understanding is is that this is something that has been taken care of and removed at the request of the church. Here's another image of the First Presidency as it appeared when President Nelson was still presidenting.
1:05:13 And that image appears to have been used in a thumbnail in 2023 general conference review by Mormon stories. Okay. So apparently they are using pictures that the church produced and that the church copyrighted at least according to this allegation. Once again my understanding is those things have been remedied by John Delin. The complaint goes on, "These and additional uses by Mormon stories of copyrighted images owned by the church and registered with the US copyright office are in exhibit two. Plaintists believe discovery is likely to show that defendants have reproduced and displayed additional copyrighted works owned and registered by the church. Mormon stories uses and has used these and other such images owned by or associated with the church as well as other design elements such as fonts, colors, fonts, fonts, color, and a light ray motif on its website and social media pages to intentionally create similarities and confusion with the church's website and
1:06:11 social media pages. Once again, pretty much all that's gone, but they're talking about it as if it still is. Although they tipped their hand when they say Mormon stories uses and has used. The problem is they use the conjunctive and not the disjunctive or. Which means that what they're alleging is that Mormon stories is both using and has used these images, these fonts, these colors, and these light ray motifs. When actually that's not correct. It is only correct in regards to some of them such as the lightwearing motif that Mormon stories has used, not uses. The word and here in that sentence is what gives the lie to this allegation in my opinion. Going on paragraph 41, for example, Mormon stories uses or has used images. Wait a second. Did you notice what they did there? They use the correct or they use the disjunctive in this allegation up here in 40. Mormon stories uses and has used. They should
1:07:12 have had or up here in 40 as well. It's a small word, but it's a very important word in the legal lexicon. And versus or the conjunctive versus the disjunctive. That's the only reason I know that the names for them. One's conjunctive, one's disjunctive, is because it's so important in the law. Otherwise, I wouldn't know what those terms are. Similar important words under the law are may versus shall. All right. One is permissive, one is mandatory. It doesn't involve this case, but I just thought I'd mention it. Okay. For example, Mormon stories uses or has used images of church president Russell M. Nelson, Joseph Smith, the church's representation of the Christristus at the center of the Christristus symbol.
1:07:56 So, in other words, just the image of Jesus himself and the well-known Salt Lake Temple in the background of the header image at the top of the Mormon stories YouTube page near defendants marks. It also has used and continues its pattern of using those and other images owned by or closely associated with the church and thumbnail images promoting its podcasts also near defendants marks and sometimes with wording that suggests affiliation or connection with the church. Examples are shown directly below and here to the extent that John Delin has remedied the thumbnails by taking out the copyrighted images. I know he's got a lot of podcasts and each one of them has a thumbnail. So there may be a lot of images to to take care of. It also has used and continues its pattern of using is the allegation those and other images. So here the language being used is saying that he's still doing this when my understanding is that he's not.
1:08:49 And once again, the attempt is to use language which is not necessarily exactly correct but in order to give the impression that the violations are ongoing and not simply something that's in the past. Examples are shown directly below. So here is oh this is from the header. This is what they were talking about. So if you look at the header once again they say this is taken before mediation began in November. This is what it looked like. It's been changed since then. The problematic parts have been removed, but that's not going to help their case. So, they're going to put up the header that was there before the mediation started.
1:09:30 So, you can see over here on the left of this header, the banner at the top, there's a Salt Lake Temple. You can see that. Then there's Joseph Smith. That's a familiar image of Joseph Smith, a painting. Then behind John Delin is the church office building. There's a group of people. I don't seem to be included. What's up with that, John? And then behind them is something and I'm not exactly sure what that is, but proceeding right in the next segment is there's the Christristus, right? Okay, that so that's being complained of then there's something in writing some kind of manuscript. And over here on the far right is President Nelson hugging somebody. So these are what they're talking about and the different images that they're complaining about John Dyn having used in the past while making it sound like he's using them in the present. And down here is the Mormon Stories logo as it used to appear in the blue with the light rays elements or imitative of the light rays elements.
1:10:23 Here's another image from a thumbnail. There's John Delin. Behind him is the Salt Lake Temple. Over there is the Christristus. That's one of the things they're complaining about because it's part of their copyright and their logo. And frankly, under the law, this part makes sense. Under the law, if you have a copyrighted image, then it's unlawful for somebody else to use it without your permission. And that's the whole point of copyright law. The thing I don't understand is why it is that they already pointed this out to John Dyn.
1:10:49 He's removed them and they're bringing it up in their complaint when they know he's already removed them. Here's a couple more thumbnails. It appears on the left is one picturing Elder Holland. And there's the old gold logo of Mormon stories with the light beams coming down. To the right it says, "Mormon church saved my life." And I think the reason they have this on here is because behind this individual who is Kira She or Sheay is that ceiling room image. See that behind her? Let me scroll up to the image that they put in their complaint that they were complaining about. They have a number of them there. I think it was a Here it is. Here's that ceiling room. See that picture of the ceiling room? That is a copyrighted image by the church. So, what they're complaining about here is the use of that copyrighted image in this thumbnail without the church's permission right there on the right. Does that make sense? Okay. Going on. Mormon stories provides podcasts, written materials,
1:11:45 and other resources relating to the church, religion, religious history, and related topics under defendants marks, including via the Mormon Stories website. Mormon stories uses or has used there's the or has used defendants marks to identify the source of the services offered under the marks and has done so in a manner calculated to create confusion with plaintiff's marks. Honestly, I do not know anybody who has been confused that Mormon stories is a product of the Mormon church.
1:12:21 Apparently, there are some of them because in a world as big as this with as many people who are so different, there are going to be some people who are going to think that that's associated with the church because they never heard of it before. And they have a few comments from some such people below to prove their point. Mormon stories was well aware of the church and it's well-known Mormon marks and light rays design marks prior to adopting defendants marks.
1:12:49 That's probably true. Mormon stories and specifically defendant John P. Dein knowingly and intentionally adopted and uses the name Mormon stories. See and uses that's present tense exclusively. Mormon stories. This is really one of the main things, if not the main thing the church is interested in. the name Mormon Stories for its podcast and business with conscious disregard of the church's rights in the Mormon marks and with the intent to cause confusion among consumers and to mislead the consuming public into believing that Mormon stories is affiliated or associated with, endorsed or approved or sponsored by or otherwise connected with the church when it is not. In addition, Mormon stories intentionally adopted and uses or has used doesn't anymore. The Blue Mormon Stories logo featuring the light raised design mark which is illustrated below is virtually indistinguishable from the church's logos featuring the light raised design marks. And there they put
1:13:52 up those logos again only the blue ones by the way and the old one that was used in the past by Mormon stories but which has been changed due to mediation. You know, it's a shame that I have to give a running commentary on this complaint to explain what it is that really has happened and what it is they're shading, what it is they're saying, what it is they're not saying in order to try and present their case in front of a judge.
1:14:16 Because really, the complaint itself should be explaining all this. It shouldn't require me to go through it and point out all of this stuff that they're not telling or they're not telling fully or they're not telling accurately to the judge. And the very fact that they're not willing to be forthright to the judge here is, I think, an indication that their credibility is not the best. I would not trust them in anything that they say because they have proven that they are not trustworthy. Going on with paragraph number 47, the nearly indistinguishable nature of the Blue Mormon Stories logo has been recognized by individuals commenting on Mormon Stories Facebook profile image as reflected in the screenshots below. So this symbol, this blue symbol with a light rays image that Mormon stories has used that they're not using anymore because of mediation.
1:15:07 We're going to show you some comments that people have made that show that they're confused about Mormon Stories actually being associated with the Mormon church. Now, whether they actually went out and found these statements independently or whether they had people go in and make these statements so they could then use them in their lawsuit. I don't know. But this is what it is that they're presenting in their complaint. And here are some of the complaints over here on the right.
1:15:36 See, there's the old Mormon stories logo. Once again, they're not saying that this is something that John Delin has ceased using. Oh, here it is on the right. I feel like I've seen that color palette somewhere before. Another statement and font too. Correct. Lol. Another statement in the background is blue. If the background is blue, then the stories are true. Another statement.
1:16:01 It's giving LDS logo vibes. Another statement. I love the color. It's more like the Book of Mormon. This was probably done back when they started using this blue symbol at Mormon stories because everybody is commenting on it like they've never seen it before. I prefer the other color, someone says probably referencing the gold color that they used to have or that brown or tan. Oh, and here they give enlarged versions of those same comments that I've already read. So, I'll just put those up there for a second. I already read them from the prior images, but there they are so that you can read them, too. Mormon stories intentionally adopted the blue Mormon stories logo with full knowledge of the church's light raised design marks and the church's use of highly similar logos. If that is true, and it may be, does it have relevance? That's my question. Does it have relevance in a lawsuit where uh at the time you file the complaint, it's already been discontinued the use of
1:16:57 that symbol by agreement and through mediation? Is it still relevant in your lawsuit against Mormon Stories? Mormon stories financially benefits from this confusion. Why? Because all these people think it's really from the church and therefore they're going to watch and contribute to Mormon stories thinking that they're contributing to the church. That's weird. I don't think that's true.
1:17:20 Even for the sake of argument, assuming for the sake of argument that a person is confused by the now no longer existent blue Mormon stories logo and the light rays design into thinking that this is coming from the church, how far do you have to watch a Mormon stories episode to realize it's not from the church? And once you've realized it's not from the church, why are you going to be contributing or donating to it? And if that's the case, then how is Mormon stories financially benefiting from the confusion that they are allegedly creating? Maybe there's other ways. I'm sure there are. I'm just not exactly sure how Mormon stories financially benefits from this confusion and they don't set that out here in the complaint. Perhaps other people can let me know how that would be. Defendants have not been authorized by the church to use defendants marks, the light raised design marks, the Christa symbol,
1:18:10 or any mark confusingly similar to the church's marks. Yeah, we understand that's the case. They got to put it in here in the complaint anyway. I imagine they have not given permission for John Delin or Open Stories to use any of their marks before filing this complaint. Ah, the church notified defendants of its concerns and attempted to work with defendants in making changes to mitigate the confusion they have caused and are likely to cause in the future. While defendants agreed to make some changes and apparently did, but they don't include that. While defendants agreed to make some changes, they were unwilling to take the actions needed to sufficiently address the confusion they had created. For example, and here they're going to recapitulate the language that they had in the introduction. For example, defendants refused to include a simple disclaimer at the beginning of podcast episodes.
1:19:03 Here it is again. And they're recapitulating the language from the beginning, the introduction of this same complaint, but making it clearer than they did in the statement that the church released about this complaint they filed. We've been over them, either verbally or in writing, acknowledging that Mormon Stories is not affiliated with the church. And really, do they have to? And why should they have to when they have made all these other changes which the church in its complaint does not acknowledge?
1:19:32 Additionally, while defendants assured the church they would remove the church's copyrighted images from their website and social media pages and would not use copyrighted images in the future, just a few days later, defendants used an image owned and registered by the church to advertise a Mormon stories podcast episode. Now, I don't know what that image is. I don't know what the facts are surrounding this. Obviously, the church is using this in order to give the impression that John Delin and Open Stories is not going to be operating in good faith.
1:20:05 They're going to continue doing this unless the court intervenes. And I expect the other filings will address this issue and what happened. And if it really was a copyrighted image, I imagine it was an oversight that occurred. Put another way, I doubt that John Delin, under the threat of a lawsuit by the LDS church, and one of the issues being his use of copyrighted images in thumbnails and his agreeing to take them off, would then thereafter intentionally and knowingly use an image from the church that's copyrighted in a thumbnail.
1:20:36 It just doesn't strike me as that kind of guy. I don't think that was intentional. Section three, effect of defendants actions. Mormon stories unauthorized use of defendants marks the Christ symbol the light raised design marks other marks incorporating plaintiff marks and other indicia as and is likely to continue to cause confusion to cause mistake or to deceive consumers and potential consumers as to Mormon stories affiliation connection or association with the church or as to the origin sponsorship or approval of Mormon stories goods or services by plaintiffs and Mormon stories unauthorized reproduction and display of the church copyrighted images in promotional materials increases the likelihood of such confusion. Once again, all that's been taken care of. I think it's really about Mormon now. And the disclaimer at the beginning of every episode, that's what this boils down to. anything. Such
1:21:33 confusion, mistake, and deception constrain the church's ability as a religious organization to ensure its members and others seeking information about the church can identify, recognize, and trust that materials and services they receive are the church's legitimate and authorized materials and services and distinguish materials from those provided by Mormon stories. Now, I will tell you that if the facts were as the complaint appears to present them, and if Mormon stories had been doing all of this stuff with the copyrighted images, with the blue logo, with the light rays, imitative design, all that kind of stuff, I can kind of see where the church is coming from. Okay, I get where they're coming from. And it would make sense to me that if John Delin and Open Stories had adamantly refused to change anything about these designs, these images, that the church would have a reasonable basis, I think, to file a lawsuit against John Delin and Open Stories to make them stop using the
1:22:37 church's property, their intellectual property. But under the real facts where the church has notified John Delin, they have all of these concerns and John Delin has taken care of all of these concerns, including putting disclaimers out, but not putting a disclaimer at the beginning of every episode and not removing the word Mormon from Mormon stories. Those are the two things that apparently John Delin has not done that the church has wanted him to do. Now the church is filing a lawsuit as if he hasn't done any of those things.
1:23:11 It makes it sound like the church is really concerned about the word Mormon and making John Delin put a disclaimer at the beginning of each of his episodes. So I think that's what this lawsuit boils down to. That's what the church really wants. Mormon stories unauthorized use of defendants marks the Christ symbol the light ra design marks other marks incorporating plaintiff's marks and other indicia falsely designates the origin of Mormon stories goods and services falsely or misleadingly describes and represents facts with respect to Mormon stories and its goods or services and falsely suggests a connection with plain paragraph 54 Mormon stories unauthorized use of defendants marks etc and other indicia has caused actual confusion usion in the marketplace. Here's where they're going to make the quotes from people who thought it was from the church. As illustrated by the following comments on the Mormon Stories Facebook and YouTube pages, first comment,
1:24:06 they're redacting all the identities. I stumbled upon the Mormon Stories podcast thinking it was church affiliated. It was quickly evident how anti- it was. Notice that. Okay, first off, it helps the church to say, "I stumbled upon the Mormon Stories podcast thinking it was church affiliated." What doesn't help the church is when it says it was quickly evident how anti it was. So apparently regardless of what's on the outside of Mormon stories, it was very evident once a person started listening that it was not associated or authorized with the Mormon church. The next comment says, "I've been watching the videos to do with teal by this channel." That was a some guy's name. He was like in charge of a cult or something. I can't remember all the details. this teal guy te a l I've been watching the videos to do with teal by this channel so something that's not directly about Mormonism but I don't understand is this channel run by
1:25:01 Mormons or ex Mormons or people who are Mormons but against radical Mormons or they don't like Mormons I don't mean to sound rude if it does I just don't understand so this is a statement they're putting up there to show confusion by people as to whether the Mormon stories channel is run by the LDS church or endorsed by the LDS church. Again, these are presented as if the church just called these comments independently. There's no indication that they had people make these comments so that they could then call them for purposes of including them in this complaint. I don't know that that's the case and that that's what happened. I'm just saying that it's a possibility that occurs to me and may have occurred to someone else. Next comment. I was searching for LDS content not too long ago and ran across this and was deceived. I listened to half of one podcast and realized what it was never listened again and realized what it was.
1:26:03 Never listened again. That's what they're saying. Okay, another comment. Thought the podcast was for people wanting to become Mormon at first. Next comment. When I first saw his podcast, I thought it was a church one, then listened and realized it was highly anti. You can see the purpose of these comments being listed that there are people out there who are being fooled into thinking that Mormon stories is associated with the church and finding out that it's not and making comments about it. So this is why this is being included.
1:26:34 Another comment is Mormon Stories podcast anti- Mormon? This is the first one I've listened to and it feels very anti- Mormon. Am I getting this wrong? Next comment. I also thought it was an LDS podcast because of their branding. Boy, that's helpful. I'm surprised that one wasn't number one on the list. I also thought it was an LDS podcast because of their branding. It only took one episode to know it was absolutely not friendly toward the church. So, the problem the church has with some of these comments is that even if we are to presume for the sake of argument that the branding of Mormon stories was intended to look like the church in order to get other people to listen that it doesn't seem to have done a very good job because even though they started listening, they realized immediately it wasn't from the church and they stopped listening. Concluding that comment, I also thought it was an LDS podcast because of their branding. It only took one episode to know it was absolutely
1:27:28 not friendly toward the church. Another comment, "You claimed to be an LDS themed podcast. Don't you mean anti-LDS?" Another comment says, "This happened to me. I saw the channel and thought it was from church members. I quickly realized that it was not and was anti-content. Just last year, a new convert in my ward went on to Mormon Stories, not realizing it was anti and got caught up in it. I was able to talk to her about it and she realized what was going on. Close call. Another comment says, "I'm confused.
1:28:01 What is this podcast?" I'm not sure that's really on point, but okay. Another comment. Hi, I'm confused. Are you for or against the Mormon church? And the comments keep coming. Four more agreed. When I first came across, by the way, this sounds like a conversation in a chat that's talking specifically about this issue. I'm not sure where it occurred, but it sounds like people are responding to each other in this conversation, saying things like, "I also thought it was an LDS podcast. It's referencing other people with the same view." Another comment that's happened to me as if, "Yeah, you're not the only one. I had the same experience."
1:28:42 Another one now saying, "Agreed." Agreeing with whom? while other people expressing the same opinion in the same conversation apparently. Agreed. When I first came across the Mormon Stories channel, I thought it was a channel run by members. Quickly found out otherwise, but can definitely be confusing for non-member or investigator. Another comment, I once accidentally started listening to Mormon Stories podcast, not realizing it was anti-LDS.
1:29:07 Uh, shocked. Then quick search into who and what it was. Not shocked. Oh, you can actually search. Oh, yeah. on the internet. You could Google that and find that out. Good idea. Another comment. I thought Mormon stories was about the Book of Mormon. I was wrong and it was hurtful. Last comment. I 100% agree. See, there's that idea. There's a conversation going on. They're getting all of these from the same place. I think I 100% agree. I subscribed to this channel immediately thinking it was church affiliated because of course that's what a good Mormon does. Very purposely deceptive.
1:29:45 But the point they're trying to make the church is is that this isn't just a theoretical injury or confusion that they're alleging. They are presenting comments from members who themselves are claiming to have been fooled and deceived by it. Paragraph 55. We're getting closer to the end. We're at page 27. There's only 30 pages in this. Hang in there. Mormon stories unauthorized use of defendants marks.
1:30:14 And I'm not going to read all that other stuff and other indicia enables Mormon stories to trade on and receive the benefit of goodwill built up by plaintiffs labor and investment of substantial resources over many years like the I'm a Mormon campaign and to gain acceptance for Mormon stories. goods and services not solely on their own merits but on the reputation and goodwill of plaintiffs plaintiffs marks and plaintiffs products and services. Yeah, I don't think that's really what's going on but they have to allege it. Mormon stories use of defendants marks etc and other indicia diminishes plaintiff's ability to exclusively control the nature and quality of products and services provided under the Mormon marks and light rays design marks which yeah Mormon stories isn't using anymore except for the word Mormon and allows Mormon stories to negatively impact plaintiff's valuable reputation and
1:31:10 goodwill unless these acts of Mormon stories are restrained by this court. They will continue. Well, almost all of them have already been restrained by John Delin himself. Boy, the court's going to have a surprise when they find that out. They will continue and they will continue to cause irrearable injury to plaintiffs and to the public. These things that John Delin isn't doing anymore are going to cause irreparable injury to plaintiffs and to the public for which there is no adequate remedy at law.
1:31:38 Count one, federal trademark infringement. So, here's where they're going to make their basic allegations under the law and say what laws they feel that John Delin and Mormon stories are violating. Federal trademark infringement. We don't have to read all that to understand what that means. Count two, violation of the LAN Act. The acts of defendants complained of herein constitute trademark infringement. False designations of origin and false or misleading descriptions or representation of fact in violation of this section of the LAN Act. Count three, trademark infringement under Utah Common Law and Utah code. So, it's the same kind of allegation under a different statute. Count four, copyright infringement. So, this is for the use of the pictures that they have copyrighted.
1:32:24 Copyright infringement under 17USC section 501 and their prayer for relief. Wherefore, based on defendants conduct complained of herein, most of which has stopped by the way by agreement of John the Lynn. Plaintiffs ask this court for the following relief against defendants. Section A says that they want the defendants and everybody associated with John Delin and open stories to be permanently enjoined and restrained from using the church's marks and any other mark etc. that is confusingly similar to plaintiff's marks and from any attempt to retain any part of the goodwill misappropriated from plaintiffs. Not exactly sure how they would do that, but okay. Defendants as well as their officers, agents, and everybody else associated with them be permanently enjoined and restrained from displaying, reproducing, etc. any copyrighted works of plaintiffs, those are the images and the pictures, or derivatives thereof,
1:33:23 including those in exhibit 2 when advertising or promoting their business or content. Any and all relief provided by these statutes. Any and all other relief the court may deem just and proper. Demand for jury trial. You can see it's just boilerplate there. Respectfully submitted. All the attorneys for the church, David J. Jordan, David Mortonson, and Eugene Pace from the law firm of Perky Barber PLLC.
1:33:49 Also those three attorneys who are coming forth from Texas, Crohakichi, Tyson Smith, Steven Molen, Ryan Miller. Because when it comes to a multi-300 billion plus church going against Mormon stories, this tiny little podcast, I mean, think about the comparison. I know that compared to my podcast, Mormon Stories is much bigger. Okay, but compared to the LDS church, Mormon Stories is nothing. It's a little mouse squeaking in a corner. And the elephant in the room is the LDS church. And apparently the elephant is scared by the mouse and decides that it wants to stomp it out of existence. So it brings not one lawyer against them to file a freaking lawsuit, but six of them. Are you freaking kidding me? Talk about overkill. Regardless of how many attorneys you have on this case, LDS Church, regardless of how much money you spend on this case, LDS Church, I have got a sneaking suspicion that you are going to lose this lawsuit if it has to go to trial. that you are going to lose
1:34:58 this lawsuit because the truth is going to come out and the truth is going to come out is that you LDS church have been highly deceptive in how you have framed this entire lawsuit in how you have framed what happened in mediation and how you have framed what it is that John Delin and Open Stories have already done and complied with which is the vast majority of your demands and they're going to find out that even though he did pursuant to your demand put up disclaimers in several places on his different platform platforms that that just wasn't good enough for you and that you wanted the unreasonable demand of having John Delin announce at the beginning of every episode that he's not affiliated with the Mormon church and that the Mormon church does not endorse what it is he's saying. That chance that's going to happen. And a fatter chance, by the way, is that you're going to be able to say that you still have an ownership interest and a trademark interest in the word Mormon after you
1:35:57 have allowed John Delin to use it in Mormon stories and Mormon matters and Mormon mental health and all these other podcasts for 20 years without raising a finger to object. You have slept on your rights. You're going to lose that, I expect. and John De will be able to continue to use the term Mormon stories as the title to his show. And it's also going to come out that for the past 10 years, the president of the church, the president of the corporation has directed all of its members not to use the word Mormon anymore, which is going to weigh against you in this lawsuit as well. And that's why I think that what has happened is that John Delin has given up or changed or amended or conceded to all the reasonable demands that the church has made. And that John Delin has refused only the two unreasonable demands that the church has made, which is that he get rid of Mormon in the title of his podcast, Mormon Stories. So, it's just going to be stories. I guess that he get rid of the term Mormon and that he put a disclaimer
1:37:01 at the beginning of every episode. And that when it comes to that point that the court will say, "No, Mormon, you don't have any protected interest in that anymore. Mormon church." And John Delane can use Mormon in the title to a show or anywhere else he wants. And that the written disclaimers that he has put on his podcast platforms are sufficient to remedy any damage that the church is alleging. and he will not be required to put a disclaimer at the beginning of every freaking episode. So, I think John is well positioned for this lawsuit. I think the church is badly positioned for this lawsuit. And I think that if the church were not badly positioned for this lawsuit, they would not feel themselves under the necessity of essentially misrepresenting a number of important facts in their complaint and further misrepresenting another even more important fact in the statement they released about this complaint to
1:37:54 indicate and demonize John Delin as if he wants to not give any disclaimer whatsoever and is actually intent on fooling people into thinking that his program is endorsed or affiliated by the LDS church, which really is laughable when you stop and think about it. All right, so that's about all for tonight. We'll see how this case progresses and I'll be here to report on it every step of the way. Once again, very, very important to understand what the complaint is that's being made by the church and filed by the church against John Delin and Open Stories in order to understand how things are going to play out later. The time we spent in doing this, which really has not been as long as I thought it would be, but still a substantial amount of time, going over the complaint will be helpful and will pay dividends going forward. It will help us understand the different twists and turns this case is bound to make as it progresses through the court system,
1:38:48 and I hope you'll join me for those podcasts as well. Remember, please hit like, please hit the subscribe button as well, and please, please go to radiorefreeormon.org or today. Make a donation there if you haven't already. Continuing donations are optimal. $5 a month is all I ask. Whatever you can afford. And I also want to thank especially all those who have gone to radio freemon.org already and made a donation there. Your donations really do keep radiorefree broadcasting behind enemy lines. Well, that's about all for tonight. Until next time, this is Radio Free Mormon signing off the air.
