Credit: 3M
3M has launched a lawsuit Zhiyu Pu and Harmen Mander, directors of Caonic Systems, Inc., for falsely affiliating themselves with 3M to sell N95 respirators at exorbitant prices during the pandemic.
The legal action was filed today in the Superior Court of Justice in Ontario.
According to the press release, the defendants registered 3M-Health.com on the Canadian e-commerce platform Shopify, and starting in March, sold respirators they fraudulently claimed originated from 3M certified suppliers in Singapore and the UK. On March 31, at 3M’s request, Shopify closed the site. Caonic Systems immediately reopened another Shopify site as www.tormenhealth.com, and continued to claim an affiliation with 3M on social media. After Shopify shut the second site, Caonic persisted, relaunching briefly on another platform. Caonic was selling the N95 respirators for $17.00 each, more than five times the appropriate retail price.
The court application is to find the location of any remaining respirators and to get the information of customers.
As per the application, 3M will assist in evaluating the respirators’ authenticity if any are found. If the N95s are authentic, 3M will support returning them for use in efforts to fight COVID-19. If they are not authentic, 3M will inform Caonic’s customers. Once the respirators are recovered, 3M will pursue damages. 3M will donate any damages recovered to COVID-19-related nonprofit organizations.
3M has filed a series of legal actions in four U.S. states over the past week.
3M says it has not changed the prices it charges for respirators as a result of the COVID-19 outbreak. According to the release, the company is working with online retailers and technology companies such as Google, Amazon and Facebook to identify and remove counterfeiters and price gougers from their sites and refer them to law enforcement authorities.