...in court papers filed today, Carroll Shelby claims that Ford Motor Company and William Clay Ford Jr. (who DID not live with Shelby and work for Shelby American in the '60's) has stolen a trade dress design that came to Shelby "in a dream" for the new Mustang design. Shelby and his legal team are asking for one hundred gazillion dollars for damages because "they knew I was gonna come up with this soon.."
Shelby, who said that he came up with the entire Mustang concept while visiting a strip club in Livonia with Lee Iacocca in 1962, claims that Ford is "out to get me" and that many others are "getting rich or at least paying most of their bills" off copies of his 1960's sports car, the Cobra. Recent legal action has pitted Shelby against most of the free world, Saddam Hussian and Pee Wee Herman.
Ford, in a press release, denies any wrong doing but has agreed to change the new Mustang design to more closely resemble the beloved icon, the AMC Pacer.
It is expected that there will be special performance versions of the new Mustang to be marketed as the " GT 349.5", the distance between the executive washrooms and the Office of the General Counsel of Ford Motor Company.
