Tony LaRussa sues Twitter impostor

St. Louis Cardinals manager Tony LaRussa is suing Twitter and an unidentified Twitter user for impersonating him on the site, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports on its website.

Cardinals beat writer Derrick Goold writes that LaRussa filed the trademark infringement and “misappropriation of likeness and name” suit in San Francisco court last month. Twitter is based in San Francisco.

The suit alleges that the unidentified Twitter user impersonated LaRussa by creating an account in his name–@TonyLaRussa–an account which has since been removed and deleted. The user impersonating LaRussa made crude and vulgar comments on the page, including several about deceased Cardinals pitchers Darryl Kile and Josh Hancock. One now deleted tweet read “Lost 2 out of 3, but we made it out of Chicago without one drunk driving incident or dead pitcher,” a reference to Kile and Hancock.

The San Francisco Chronicle writer Philip Matier reports that LaRussa attempted to contact Twitter and have the account removed through his lawyer but received no response. Matier adds that the account disappeared “within a half hour of the trademark infringement complain being filed.”

Click here to access the official court documents. Enter “CGC09488101″ when prompted for a case number.

Update: June 6, 2009: Tony LaRussa and Twitter have reached a settlement on the case. The Associated Press has the details.