By Brooke Everett
brooke@newsroom.byu.edu
The new lapel pin poking fun at the Olympic bid scandal has been pulled off the market because a the Salt Lake Tribune is claiming it owns the phrase, 'The Best Games Money Can Buy.'
The phrase was one of the four registered with the state in March 1999 by the newspaper said Attorney for the Salt Lake Tribune, Michael O' Brien.
The other phrases are 'Best Games $$ Can Buy,' '2002: The Buck Started Here, and '2002: The Buck Stopped Here.'
O'Brien said he sent a letter to Jim Friedman, local entrepreneur and Mell Bailey, owner of the Spirit of Games store in Fashion Place Mall in Murray.
Friedman developed the silver lapel pin bearing the slogan, 'The Best Games Money Can Buy!'
The pin features five caricatures sketched on five coins. The caricatures are identified by their first name: Tom, Deedee, Juan, Frank and Mike.
The names refer to former bid leader Tom Welch, former Salt Lake Mayor Deedee Corradini, International Olympic Committee President Juan Antonio Samaranch, former bid Chairman Frank Joklik and Gov. Mike Leavitt.
'We asked them to discontinue marketing the pin. I have not heard anything back from the people I sent the letter to,' O'Brien said.
'It is surprising that a mogul in the community would trademark a controversial slogan like that.' Bailey said, 'We have pulled them off right now. I haven't heard anything else from them.'
Bailey said this scandal with the Salt Lake Tribune would make the many pins she already sold worth more.
The newspaper donates all profits derived from the phrases to the YWCA Battered Women's Shelter, O'Brien said.
'The Tribune demands that you account for all profits derived from the sale of pins or other products using the phrases and contribute such profits either directly or through The Tribune to the YWCA Battered Women's Shelter,' O'Brien said in his letter.
Carrie Romano, development director of the Salt Lake YWCA said the Tribune spoke with former board president about the donations but Romano said nothing has been decided.
'Nothing has been formally decided. It is pending board approval,' Romano said.
O'Brien said the Tribune has already produced pins in the shape of a mini-newspaper featuring the phrases.
'I would like to see these so-called pins The Tribune has made,' Bailey said.
SLOC media representative Caroline Shaw said anything related to the 2002 Olympics could be a copyright infringement.
'The Tribune might have gotten itself into hot water with SLOC,' Bailey said.