American Apparel shifts attack from Woody Allen to lawyer nemesis

Most companies use ads to build a brand or promote a product. American Apparel would apparently prefer to use its ad budget to make a big point regardless of any legal consequences.

The company is already fighting a legal war with Woody Allen after posting Woody's image on a billboard.

Now it's ramping up a battle with attorney Keith Fink.

Some history about Fink: The lawyer has a reputation for targeting celebrities and others in the entertainment industry. He sued Marilyn Manson for allegedly using the band's money to purchase Nazi skeletons. He sued a Hollywood agent for sexually harassing an assistant by, among other things, making fun of Brad Pitt's genitalia. He went after Ellen DeGeneres over the adoption of a dog. Most recently, Fink squared off against blogger Perez Hilton over the PerezRevenge website.

But Fink's nastiest and most long-running battle has been with American Apparel. Fink represented a former sales manager who sued the company's CEO Dov Charney for sexual harassment, and the two sides have been trading nasty blows in the press for a couple of years.

American Apparel had been buying ads in UCLA's student newspaper lambasting Fink (a lecturer at the school), but apparently the Daily Bruin had enough. So now a new jaw-dropping attack on Fink appears in the May 11th issue of L.A. Business Journal.

We wonder whether Charney and Co. consulted their lawyers before running this ad (click to enlarge):