Precedential TTAB decision: a former associate did not own the BIRTH JUSTICE logo when she filed

What the Board decided

The opinion states that it is a precedent of the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board. It was mailed September 10, 2026. The hearing was December 10, 2025. The panel was Judges English, Stanley, and Lavache, and Judge Stanley wrote the opinion. Emily Grace Thomas seeks registration on the Principal Register of a composite mark for "legal services, namely, providing legal consultation and research services, and litigation assistance and strategy services relating to birth injury," in Class 45. The application describes the mark as the word BIRTH above the word JUSTICE, with a stylized design to the left of the words of lady justice holding a baby in her right arm and a sword behind her. BIRTH JUSTICE is disclaimed. Serial No. 90387461 was filed on December 16, 2020, under Section 1(a), based on an allegation of use, with February 25, 2019 alleged as the date of first use anywhere and in commerce. Olsman, MacKenzie, Peacock & Wallace, P.C. opposed on non-ownership, on fraud based on non-ownership and an incorrect domicile address, and on likelihood of confusion under Section 2(d).

What the Board held

The Board sustained the opposition on non-ownership only. The decision states that the opposition is sustained on the ground that the applicant was not the owner of the applied-for mark when she filed the opposed application. The Board found that the opposer proved entitlement to a statutory cause of action, and proved by a preponderance of the evidence that, in her individual capacity, she did not own the Birth Justice logo for the services in the application as of the December 16, 2020 filing date. The Board did not reach the other claims.

She admitted she was employed by the firm from approximately June 2018 through early September 2021, that she was employed there as of the claimed first-use date of February 25, 2019, and that she left on or about September 2, 2021. The opinion states that she joined the firm on June 4, 2018, as an associate attorney. In January 2018, before that job, she conceived a Birth Justice brand and an image of Lady Justice holding a baby. The opinion says that on January 1, 2018 she sketched that concept, and that she did not use those sketches on any goods or services. It notes that the sketchbook images are undated, and that whether they were made on January 1, 2018 or later does not affect its analysis. On January 28, 2018 she registered the domain name birthjustice.com. The Board stated that it is well settled that merely designing or inventing a symbol does not create trademark rights, and that registering a domain name, standing alone, does not confer them. It noted that she acknowledged bringing only a concept for a logo and preliminary sketches to the firm, not a finished logo, and it concluded that neither her January 2018 conception of the brand, including her rough sketches, nor her registration of birthjustice.com established ownership of the logo on their own. The logo had not been finalized, and it had not been used in connection with any goods or services.

The Board found that, while she was an associate, she and others at the firm, working with a graphic design firm that the firm retained and paid, developed her idea into a final logo design that she and the firm used to promote her birth-injury specialty at the firm. The parties agree the logo was first used in commerce at an American Association for Justice conference in Atlanta, Georgia, in October 2018. The Board found that the first use was her distribution of business cards at that conference, and that the cards identified her as an attorney of the firm. It found that this use, and later use through the December 16, 2020 filing date, inured to the firm and did not inure to her in her individual capacity. It found that her part in creating the logo, and her later use of it, were within the scope of her employment, and that this did not make her the owner.

What this decision does not decide

The Board did not reach the fraud claim or the Section 2(d) claim. Sustaining the opposition tells you the Board found she was not the owner of the applied-for mark when she filed. It does not tell you that the Board decided fraud or likelihood of confusion. The opinion states that it is a precedent of the TTAB.