Use of Word 'Korean' Ruled Discriminatory

"For example, there is a phenomenal basketball player currently playing in the NBA by the name of Yao Ming. Mr. Ming is a Chinese national," Sterling wrote in his declaration. "As I understand plaintiffs' broad requested injunction (i.e., limiting my right to use the terms Asian, Korean or similar words in any business advertisements) I would be restricted from placing advertisements about this phenomenal 'Asian' and/or 'Chinese' basketball player."

Judge Matz rejected the Yao Ming argument as "silly and farfetched." "If Mr. Sterling placed an ad in the Los Angeles Times announcing 'Clippers Have Signed Chinese Star Yao Ming to Five-Year Contract,' he would violate no law prohibiting discrimination. (Indeed, he would probably earn plaudits)," the judge wrote in his July 28 ruling.

Citing the city's "acute shortage of housing rental units," the judge also rejected his argument that those who have taken "a fancy" to the Korean building names would pack up and leave if the name changed. Matz also made a distinction between Koreatown, a geographic location, and the word Korean.

"Uneasy relations among different racial and immigrant groups still prevail in various sections of this city, and many residents would understandably regard the decision to place the word 'Korean' in the name of a building in a racially diverse neighborhood as a coded message: Koreans and Korean Americans are welcome and preferred; others are not."

The judge did not prohibit use of the South Korean flag, calling it a representation of American Korean Land Co., another Sterling company.

Bill Araiza, a law professor at Loyola Marymount Law School, called the ruling significant, saying it addresses the "sophisticated" form of discrimination that occurs today.

"It makes a lot of sense in the real world where there's all sorts of subliminal signaling that goes on," he said. "Discrimination today is very often subtle, because nobody or very few people today say, 'You're black so you can't come in.'

"I've got to believe that sophisticated landlords, large-scale landlords, would be paying attention to this."

The court also has prohibited Sterling from asking his tenants where they were born. According to Sterling, after the Sept. 11 attacks an FBI agent met with Sterling's controller and said the landowner should make every possible effort to learn whether his tenants were "foreign nationals."