DMA Threatens Pike With Legal Action

An attorney for the Direct Marketing Association has sent board member Gerry Pike a cease-and-desist letter. Pike has been waging a proxy battle, in which – as of last Friday – he has sent three e-mail blasts to DMA members requesting proxy vote authorization for the organization’s upcoming business meeting. Pike has responded to the DMA’s letter.

According to the DMA attorney’s cease-and-desist letter, Pike’s communications “have damaged DMA and have otherwise had significant and material negative consequences to the Association.”

The letter, which is dated Sept. 30, also charged Pike with misusing the DMA’s e-mail, fax and telephone lists, which, it alleges, Pike obtained through “improper means”. It further accused Pike of “dissemination of misleading and inflammatory public statements about DMA and its representatives.

“Please be advised that if you do not immediately comply with the demand set forth herein, DMA intends to pursue legal action against you,” the DMA’s attorney wrote in the letter.

“The [list] charge is a fabrication, ergo all of the charges that stem from the allegation have no merit.” Pike told Direct Newsline.

Calls to Douglas Baldridge, the attorney at Venable LLP who signed the cease and desist letter were not answered at deadline.

According to the letter, Pike asked for, and received, a list of DMA members from the organization on Sept. 24.Pike acknowledged asking for the list, but said he did so in his capacity as current chair of Direct Voice, the DMA’s political action committee (PAC).

“It is standard practice for a PAC chairman to be managing information related to the solicitation of funds for the PAC,” Pike said. “There is nothing out of the ordinary about that whatsoever. This is a deliberate distortion, and an attempt to demonize it as having been subverted for purposes unrelated to the PAC. That has not happened, that has never happened.”

Pike said his proxy solicitation list was generated from contacts gleaned during his 30 years in the direct marketing community. During that time, Pike has held a number of positions within the DMA.

As for the charge of making misleading and inflammatory statements, “I have no idea,” Pike said. “And if they had an idea they would delineate it. But I will say this: I think it is indicative of management’s attitude that if members do not get the gospel the way is written by management, then somehow it is detrimental to the association. I think our members are too smart for that.”

Pike has responded to the DMA’s attorney, denying the allegations. In part, Pike’s letter said he is acting in accordance with his fiduciary duties, that his actions are in furtherance of the best interests of the DMA, and that the DMA’s letter “made a number of incorrect statements and mischaracterize me and my motives.”

Pike added “Your time and effort would be better directed at fixing what is wrong rather than trying to intimidate the messenger…It is a further indication of how far astray current management is that they are not able to engage these issues in a straight forward manner but instead resort to threats and intimidation.”