MANALAPAN — The owner of a New Jersey business says he's getting death threats from people who mistakenly think his business is the one accused of price-gouging New York City over personal protective equipment.

Bob Drake's company, Performance Screen Supply, is based in Manalapan — just like the similarly named Performance Supply LLC, the actual target of price-gouging allegations.

In documents filed in the Southern District of New York, St. Paul, Minnesota-based 3M has accused Performance Supply LLC of Manalapan of trademark infringement, deceptive practices and false advertising.

According to the lawsuit, Performance Supply offered to sell several million N95 respirator masks to New York's Office of Citywide Procurement last month. An exhibit attached to the lawsuit shows a price quote sent to the city offering seven million masks at prices ranging from $6.05 to $6.35 per mask. 3M's suggested list price for the respirators is between $1.02 and $1.31, the company said in the suit.

Performance Supply falsely claimed it was an authorized 3M distributor, according to 3M.

But Performance Screen Supply is an unrelated business that sells screen printing equipment and embroidery supplies, Drake told the New York Daily News. He said he has spent the past two days bearing the brunt of anger over the case in nasty phone calls and emails.

Performance Supply appears to have little or no Web or social media presence. Performance Screen Supply, however, comes up among the Google search results for "Performance Supply."

Drake told the Daily News that he received more 100 messages from people who hoped he went bankrupt and worse. Laywers from 3M called to offer their apologies and to ask if he knows anything about the other company, he said.

A document from the state Division of Revenue and Enterprise Services dated April 10 shows the Performance Screen Supply was registered with the state on Feb. 23, 2012.

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Drake has not yet returned a message from New Jersey 101.5 on Sunday morning.

(Includes material copyright 2020 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)

Contact reporter Dan Alexander at Dan.Alexander@townsquaremedia.com or via Twitter @DanAlexanderNJ

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