Sean P. Gates

Sean P. Gates is a California attorney and a principal of the law firm Charis Lex PC. He served as counsel of record for plaintiff Jaime Rogozinski in Rogozinski v. Reddit, Inc., filed in 2023 in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California, in which Rogozinski, the founder of the r/WallStreetBets subreddit, claimed ownership of the 'WallStreetBets' trademark and alleged he had been wrongfully removed as the community's moderator. The district court dismissed the case, and the dismissal was affirmed by the Ninth Circuit in 2025 on the ground that Reddit, not Rogozinski, was the first to use the mark in commerce. The litigation is a frequently cited example of the tension between Reddit and the volunteer founders and moderators of its largest communities over who controls a subreddit's identity and value.