By Patrick Hedlund
DNAinfo News Editor
MANHATTAN — A series of storefronts in Chinatown that were raided for selling counterfeit goods agreed to pay the city $800,000 for the right to reopen.
But the reincarnated stores along the famous Counterfeit Triangle — an area bounded by Canal, Centre and Walker Streets — will have to promise not to sell knock-offs if their owners want to stay in business.
In February 2008, the Mayor’s Office of Special Enforcement raided and shuttered 32 storefronts in Chinatown for selling fake trademarked merchandise.
The phony goods boasted such high end brand names as Rolex, Gucci and Chanel and had an estimated street value of more than $1 million.
The city followed the raid by filing a nuisance abatement lawsuit against the properties’ owner, requiring the landlord to pay a substantial fine and to reopen the mall with legitimate businesses.
“Property owners should know that they are responsible for what goes on in their buildings and that hosting illegal activity like counterfeiting is a losing proposition,” Mayor Michael Bloomberg said in a statement detailing the settlement.
“Counterfeiting deprives legitimate businesses of customers and their employees of their paychecks. We will continue to go after the street-level counterfeiters, the wholesalers and the property owners that look the other way.”
After the raid, the managing agent for the stores’ owner, Terranova Properties, told the New York Times it was “working together with New York City and will continue to cooperate to the utmost degree with the New York City Police Department and the mayor’s office to remedy this situation on Canal Street.”
The Office of Special Enforcement made 42 undercover purchases at the stores prior to the 2008 raid, netting phony name-brand knockoffs of Coach, Dolce & Gabbanna, Dior, Prada, Burberry and Calvin Klein products.
“Counterfeit goods are inferior products that cheat everyone, from the consumer who purchases a poorly made item, to the legitimate business owners cheated of sales, to the city who loses tax revenue,” Shari C. Hyman, director of the Mayor's Office of Special Enforcement, said in the statement.
“Property owners should know that if they play host to illegal vendors, we will use the Nuisance Abatement law to shut down the buildings and exact a serious financial penalty.”
The Office of Special Enforcement raided another strip of storefronts on Canal Street selling counterfeit goods earlier this year, forcing the closure of 31 stalls between Broadway and West Broadway.
