Domestic manufacturer Kinetic Industries, Inc. challenged the refusal by the International Trade Administration to initiate an AD administrative review of saccharine from China for the July 2009 - June 2010 period, arguing that Taiwanese companies were repackaging Chinese-produced saccharin and re-exporting it to the U.S. to evade AD duties. The Court of International Trade concurred with the ITA’s reasoning that since repackaging does not amount to “assembly,” the Taiwanese exporters were not “interested parties “ under the relevant statute (19 USC 1677j). The court also agreed with the ITA that the alleged transshipments would be better addressed in an anti-circumvention inquiry, or in a Customs and Border Protection investigation that could result in monetary penalties for transshipments arising from negligence or fraud. (Slip Op. 11-138, dated 11/17/11)
The Justice Department has announced that on November 15, 2011, Belal Amin Alsaidi pleaded guilty to trafficking in shoes and apparel that he knew were counterfeit at his two stores in Petersburg, Virginia from May 2007 until March 2009. According to court documents, Alsaidi received more than 1,400 packages of counterfeit merchandise at his stores from New York. The merchandise bore fake trademarks for companies such as Nike, NFL, Lacoste, True Religion and Coogi. At sentencing, which is scheduled for February 23, 2012, Alsaidi faces a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and a $2 million fine.
According to sources from the American Trucking Associations (ATA), the organization plans to appeal a September 26, 2011 decision by the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. While the Court overturned the Port of Los Angeles' ban on owner-operators as part of its concession agreement in favor of ATA, the Court decided to uphold certain other Port requirements relating to (i) truck parking, (ii) financial capability, (iii) maintenance, and (iv) placards.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has announced that Saidou Dia, of St. Louis, Missouri, was sentenced to 57 months in federal prison and a lifetime of supervised release on charges relating to a large-scale bootleg movie business, and failing to register as a sex offender1. He pleaded guilty in August 2011.
The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has ruled that the two year time limit in 19 USC 1515(a) for CBP to decide protests is not mandatory. Hitachi Home Electronics (America) Inc. had argued that all protests not allowed or denied within the two-year statutory time period should automatically be “deemed allowed by operation of law.” The CAFC said that the time limit is merely directory, and 28 USC 1581(i)1 jurisdiction for this case is not triggered if CBP fails to act in the two year period.
The Office of Foreign Assets Control has announced civil penalties of $15,000 for a Minnesota company and $5,400 for an Alabama company for separate violations of the Iran Transaction Regulations. OFAC determined that both companies did not voluntarily disclose these matters to OFAC and that the apparent violations constituted non-egregious cases. Civil penalties for both companies were lower than the base penalty for the alleged violations.
Chinese producers challenged the International Trade Administration’s 2006 less-than-fair-value determination on diamond sawblades and parts thereof from China: the use of “zeroing” (the elimination of non-dumped transactions from the margin calculation), the choice of a particular Indian surrogate firm for expense and profit ratios, and the valuation of steel inputs. Domestic producers challenged the ITA’s country-of-origin determination and the award of a separate rate to Advanced Technology & Materials Co. Ltd. and its affiliates (ATM), but the Court of International Trade dismissed all complaints except the steel valuation and the separate rates decision, both of which it remanded to the ITA.
In 2006, the International Trade Administration published a determination of dumping margins in the less-than-fair-value investigation of diamond saw blades and parts thereof from Korea; however, the order was recently revoked in an ITA section 129 determination, due to an adverse panel report from the World Trade Organization on the use of zeroing in the ITA’s calculations (zeroing is omitting non-dumped sales from the overall margin calculation). Despite this, the Court of International Trade agreed with the Diamond Sawblades Manufacturers’ Coalition that domestic producers risked irreversible damage from Korean entries, and that they had some likelihood of success in their litigation over the ITA’s methods in the investigation. Accordingly, the court granted an injunction to delay liquidation of entries of Korean diamond saw blades, for which liquidation has been suspended since January 23, 2009. (Slip Op. 11-137, dated 11/03/11)
The Justice Department has announced that Guillermo Mondino, the owner of Texon Inc., an export company in Miami, was sentenced to 46 months in prison for his role in a scheme to defraud the Export-Import Bank of approximately $24 million.
The Court of International Trade has ruled in the test case Airflow Technology, Inc., v. U.S., that Sperifilt air filter media is properly classified as a duty-free nonwoven in HTS heading 5603 and not a textile fabric or article under heading 5911 as argued by Customs. The CIT stated that the Sperifilt is not classifiable in heading 5911 because, according to Chapter 59 Note 7, the Sperifilt is not a "textile fabric", is not similar to textile fabrics used for card clothing, and is not a "textile article."