Hasbro Inc., the giant Pawtucket-based toy maker, is being challenged to a duel over its wildly successful line of high-tech "Super Soaker" water guns.

A Connecticut agent, who represents an Oklahoma inventor, has accused the Rhode Island company of siphoning designs to boost the strength of the already-powerful Soaker. The agent, Gary Ahlert, owner of Creative Group Marketing of Stamford, Connecticut, has filed a federal lawsuit against Hasbro, and its Mount Laurel, New Jersey, subsidiary, Larami Corporation.

The fight has some of the characteristics of a schoolyard dustup. The agent and his inventor are taking the role of David to Hasbro's Goliath, with the little squirts complaining that the big guys broke the rules.

Ahlert represents Greg Ross, 46, a maintenance manager of a hospital in Fairview, Oklahoma, who uses his spare time to invent such devices as a light switch that's easier for small children to turn on and a de-icer to help start cars. Back in 1994, one of Ross's ideas was the "Water Rat," supposedly an improvement on Super Soaker technology. The Soaker itself was a legendary advance on old-time squirt guns, because it used compressed air to fire a torrent of water. This increased a water gun's range from eight feet to more than 50.

The Water Rat came with a "unique internal rubber bladder system," the lawsuit says, that allowed backyard warriors to release powerful water jets without having to manually pump compressed air. Another innovation was a "quick fill" mechanism that enabled a gun to be refilled directly from a tap or garden hose.

According to Robert L. Greener, of Horowitz, Greener, & Stengel, a law firm with Empire State Building offices, these ideas made the gun faster to fill and at least as powerful as earlier guns. On Ross's behalf, Ahlert approached Larami, obtaining a promise of secrecy while technicians considered the innovations. The company eventually sent the Water Rat packing.

Several years later, lawyer Greener says, Ross was still refining his ideas and happened to be taking apart a new-generation Super Soaker. In the guts of that toy were devices mirroring his bladder and quick-fill mechanisms, he told Ahlert. Hasbro touted the new models as using its "CPS" or "constant pressure system," along with a "two-way fast-filler" mechanism, according to the court papers.

A press release by the plaintiffs says Hasbro's Super Soaker line in the past five years is believed to have had sales between $500 million and more than $1 billion.

Hasbro itself is playing its cards close to the vest. Spokesman Wayne Charness did not return a reporter's call. Greener says Hasbro has filed a reply, denying the allegations, in the New Jersey court.

Meanwhile, Hasbro is pushing the Super Soaker full blast. Its Web site touts its latest model, the CPS4100. The new Super Soaker has "unmistakable drenching power," Hasbro declares, and promises that, with a variety of nozzle settings, the gun can "meet any soaking need."

Issue Date: August 9 - 15, 2002