A judge dismissed all allegations against Sprint Corp. and its subsidiaries in a lawsuit filed by a man who alleged that a phone he bought from a retail store in Pasadena contained pornography seen by his underage son.
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Michelle Rosenblatt found that the salesman who sold the phone to Arsen Garibyan worked for an independent dealer and not for Sprint even though he wore a Sprint Nextel shirt and name tag. She noted that lawyers for the plaintiff acknowledged in their own court papers that the store was actually run by Global Elite Telecom, which also was sued by Garibyan.
“It appears that (the salesman) acted as an employee of the Global defendants,” Rosenblatt wrote in her ruling issued Wednesday. “Moreover, plaintiffs have not established how the Global defendants and Sprint are related.”
Garibyan’s allegations against Sprint were fraud, misrepresentation, breach of the implied warrant of merchantability and unfair competition. He filed the lawsuit in October 2013 on behalf of his son. The complaint also alleged the phone was used rather than new, as Garibyan thought.
According to the complaint, Garibyan bought two phones along with a cellular service plan in October 2011 at the Sprint store on Lake Avenue. He says the phones were packaged in new boxes with original instructions and manuals.
After Garibyan and his son returned home, the boy used one of the phones to play games, according to the complaint.
“After a few minutes, (the boy) started asking, ‘Daddy, what is this?,”’ the suit states. “When Mr. Garibyan looked at the telephone in (his son’s) hand, to his shock, horror and disgust, (the child) was looking at pornographic photos and videos contained on one of the newly purchased phones.”
The images were of a male and a female sales representative the father recognized from the same store where he bought the phones, according to the suit.
