As reported by Shanghai Legal News and others, the Shanghai No. 3 Intermediate People’s Court upheld a 3.5-year prison sentence and 1.6 million RMB fine for the principal defendant for counterfeiting DIOR service marks. An accomplice was sentenced to one-year suspended sentence and 50,000 RMB fine. 

From 2020, the defendant Huang XX successively operated Sichuan Fu XX Company and other companies, and hired the defendant Wang XX and others. Without the permission of the registered service mark owner, he carried out children’s fashion shows with the “DIOR” registered trademark in Shanghai, Shenyang, Wuhan and other places, and collected registration fees. The defendants Huang and Wang also purchased clothing of the same style as brands such as DIOR from informal channels at low prices, and purchased collar tags and washing labels with the registered trademarks of the aforementioned brands. They counterfeited brand-name clothing by replacing and sewing the collar tags and washing labels for use in children’s fashion shows.

The Court determined that from October 2021 to March 2023, the defendant Huang organized 7 fashion shows with the registered trademark “DIOR”, with illegal income totaling more than 800,000 RMB from August 2022 to March 2023, the defendant Wang participated in the organization and implementation of 4 of these fashion shows, with illegal income totaling more than 500,000 RMB.

On December 25, 2023, public security authorities seized clothing items, collar tags, care labels, and hang tags bearing registered trademarks such as “DIOR” at the office of Beijing Fu XX Company and the residence of the defendant Huang. The rights holders identified all of the items as counterfeit. On December 25, 2023, and May 10, 2024, the defendants Huang and Wang were arrested by public security authorities. Upon arrest, Huang failed to truthfully confess the primary facts of the crime, while Wang did so. Following the first-instance judgment, Huang appealed to the Shanghai No. 3 Intermediate People’s Court, alleging that the original judgment had inaccurate findings of fact. The Shanghai No. 3 Intermediate People’s Court affirmed the first-instance judgment.

This case is notable as service marks were only added into the scope of criminal law in the 2021 amendment to the Criminal Law. Further, only in 2025 did the Supreme People’s Court’s Interpretation on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Laws in Handling Criminal Cases of Infringement of Intellectual Property Rights clarify that service mark counterfeiting is subject to criminal prosecution.

Wu Bo, Vice President of the Shanghai No. 3 Intermediate People’s Court and presiding judge of the case, stated: This case is a typical new type of case. The People’s Court, in accordance with the provisions of the Criminal Law and the latest judicial interpretations, punished the crime in accordance with the law and protected the service trademarks of foreign brands. It reflects the clear direction of using the rule of law to safeguard the business environment and also reflects the equal protection of international brands in accordance with the law. It can be said that from a judicial perspective, it shows that “China’s door of opening up will only open wider and wider.”

                                                                                                                                     Source.   Shanghai Legal News