Did Paul Duffy's Wife Admit That He Was Engaged In Interstate Extortion On Facebook?
from the oops,-did-i-say-that? dept
Paul Duffy, as many of you know, is one of the key players in the Prenda/Anti-Piracy Law Group game. In fact, he's "officially" the only named partner of Prenda -- though others have argued that it's really John Steele and Paul Hansmeier pulling Duffy's strings. Either way, Duffy might want to have a talk with his wife. As some folks noticed, late on Monday, his wife, Shari Duffy made a post on Facebook (since deleted) about her husband's activities, in which she lashes out at those who have pointed out that he's engaged in what various courts have now called a "fraud on the court" by calling them "the worst kinds of thieves imaginable." But, the key thing is the final line of her comment:
Here's a fun fact...my husband sues people for pirating porn and the phone companies for putting it in the hands of people under 18...the men caught really hate his firm and have tried to harm him physically and financially, but they are the worst kind of thieves imaginable and shame on all the mobile carriers for allowing people to move X rated material to the hands of minors. Someone we know paid an undisclosed amount to settle a case so that we would not release his name to the public.It's worth pointing out that the folks involved in various trolling efforts have generally bent over backwards to avoid saying that they're getting people to pay them to avoid being named, because, you know, that's illegal. As former federal prosecutor, Ken "Popehat" White notes, this "sounds like a confession of interstate extortion to me." And remember that Judge Wright, in the Southern District of California, has already claimed that Duffy's actions (along with Steele and Hansmeier) should be investigated by the US Attorneys for racketeering -- and extortion is generally a key part of many racketeering schemes.
I'm no expert on extortion law, so for those who are, please weigh in, but it seems like 18 USC 875(d) might be particularly relevant here:
Whoever, with intent to extort from any person, firm, association, or corporation, any money or other thing of value, transmits in interstate or foreign commerce any communication containing any threat to injure the property or reputation of the addressee or of another or the reputation of a deceased person or any threat to accuse the addressee or any other person of a crime, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both.Admitting that the person paid up to avoid being named, and not because of any merit in the accusations seems to be a pretty clear admission to violating that law. We've heard of stupid criminals getting rung up for their own social networking posts, but how about their wives "bragging" about their actions and admitting to federal crimes in the process?
And, of course, not that it needs to be said, but while perhaps some of the people speaking out against Duffy and his firm were caught in his scheme to get people to pay up, many of us have never been involved or accused of infringement, and are speaking out because we think his actions are an abuse of the legal system to shake people down for money -- pretty much exactly as Shari perhaps inadvertently admitted.
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Filed Under: admissions, extortion, facebook, paul duffy, shari duffy, trolling
Companies: anti-piracy law group, prenda, prenda law
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Umm, oops...
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I fully expect that at the end this all, Steele will be screaming how he would have gotten away with it, if it hadn't been for those meddling kids.
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Ruh-roh!
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Mystery Solved!
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Duffy should take Etna's advice...
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I agree as well. Pornography is legalized prostitution. The only difference between me and her is I don't think prostitution should be illegal in the first place. Granted, I am assuming that Julie thinks both porn and prostitution should be illegal.
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Assumptions can be funny... my read of her post was that she might be looking for work. I mean after all the context was Duffy helping the legalized pimps.
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Copyright enforcement's best and brightest. The pride and joy of out_of_the_lube's heroic hall of fame. Bless their little pornographic, morally equestrian hearts.
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John may only get a criminal conviction.
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> Stupid non-lawyers are prone to these sorts of mistakes all the time
The stupid non-lawyer mistake she made, like others do all the time, was to brag about it to others (who can be questioned) and to brag about it in writing online (where it can never go away) and where Twitter's records can be subpoenaed in discovery in a federal criminal case.
Yes, as you say, the non-lawyer wife simply cites the motivation for the settlement. But Duffy is involved in a scheme designed to force settlements for exactly that motive. It is known as: blackmail, extortion.
So what is the absurd conclusion? Are you saying the obvious conclusion is absurd. The same conclusion everyone else, including federal judges reach?
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Funny how it's the technology and economics people with actual expertise on how these things work who talk about how DRM doesn't work, file sharing can't be stopped, etc., yet it's lawyers without useful or relevant expertise who believe they have the judgment to discern correct policy.
By an accident of birth, you live inside a technological society based on computers you did absolutely nothing to create or maintain, yet you speak against it out of the other side of your disgusting mouth, offensive to the people actually keeping your lifestyle comfortable.
Bottom line: lawyers are as qualified to set technology policy as they are to set environmental policy.
"Parasitism" isn't strong enough a word to describe your existence.
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Or well, actually, they seem to be blaming the ISPs for delivering their porn when the children access it.
Never mind.
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Especially impressive when you consider that at the same time that she is blindly ignoring the minors she considers as being protected are generally more skilled at aquiring porn than the adults they extorting.
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Since he is a fraud, isn't actually representing the copyright owners and is just pocketing the extortion money, he's totally in the clear :)
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Mike admitz what we knowz: "I'm no expert on extortion law".
I'd say that your rabidly zealous ginning up this everyday sequence as if extortion is verging on defamation, and there's certainly a track record of posts here to substantiate an on-going campaign. -- Now you're attacking wives! Good move, "no expert".
Just because Prenda is horrible doesn't mean that Mike is right on this or his other rants.
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Re: Mike admitz what we knowz: "I'm no expert on extortion law".
I'm sorry, but I'm gonna have to throw a GrammarException at you.
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Re: Re: Mike admitz what we knowz: "I'm no expert on extortion law".
Fatal Error: Uncaught GrammarException
Would you like to send a report?
[Yes] [No] [Ignore and Reopen]
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Re: Re: Mike admitz what we knowz: "I'm no expert on extortion law".
He did the best he could with what he's got. It's not right to make fun of the mentally handicapped.
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Re: Mike admitz what we knowz: "I'm no expert on extortion law".
how many of those instances also included the threat of defamation?
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Re: Mike admitz what we knowz: "I'm no expert on extortion law".
Hi, no.
So, grade 4 latin. "Ex" = "out" or "out of", "tort" is actually rooted in "torquere" meaning "to twist", so "out of twisting" or "extract by twisting" is about what "ex tort" in Latin translates to.
Further, while the word is rooted in Latin, and we don't actually use Latin, so grade 4 transliteration into a dead language isn't the pithy or biting argument you seem to believe, and probably doesn't carry much legal weight either.
But other than the incorrect translation which is meaningless anyways, that was a great argument.
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Re: Re: Mike admitz what we knowz: "I'm no expert on extortion law".
It has rung down the curtain, and joined the choir invisible. It is no longer.
It is an ex-tort!
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Re: Mike admitz what we knowz: "I'm no expert on extortion law".
Interesting theory, but perhaps you should learn to use a dictionary prior to pontificating. "Extort" is from the Latin "extortus", meaning to "obtain by coercion or intimidation." "Tort" is also from Latin, but from "tortum" or "tortus", meaning "Any civil wrong or injury; a wrongful act (not involving a breach of contract) for which an action will lie; a form of action, in some parts of the United States, for a wrong or injury." It appears the two words are only somewhat related homonyms (however, I'm no expert on dead languages).
On a more relevant note, have you yet nailed down the date and time when Mike peed in your cornflakes? I ask because I can't think of any other reason why you'd continue to force yourself read his stuff. You don't appear to gain any pleasure or knowledge from the experience.
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Re: Mike admitz what we knowz: "I'm no expert on extortion law".
There is nothing funnier than watching someone, you in particular, trying and failing to burn someone with completely incorrect info.
I wonder what your definition of schadenfreude is?
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She really is stupid, isn't she?
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steal from the porn companies?
I mean porn is great and all, but I'd hardly rate it as the most noble cause imaginable.. What about people who steal organs from hospitals or something?
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Maybe he didn't get her a good enough Mother's Day gift? Forgot her bday? Hell hath no fury...
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She is worse than the the people they are extorting.
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I have sent letters to her family stating unless they give me $1500 I will release her most intimate secrets to all the neighbours.
I have her address (It's the same as mine) and I consider this 100% proof that she's guilty of SOMETHING.....
I have to go now, because I have a meeting at my child's school (I will be there purely to represent my child but I have no financial interest in it) because they want to ask me why someone called 'Alan Cooper' has signed a permission slip.
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Duffy, and the others should have no objections at all, in having the same standard applied to them, that they have confidently applied to others.
On the other hand, because this has become, as one poster mentioned, "a performance art piece", and it appears that Duffy looks like he is getting tossed under the bus, maybe someone else with the firm, had the Facebook account hacked, to create some evidence to support the theory that Duffy was the rogue mastermind behind everything.
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It would be nice to see her caught up in all of this and have to face the brutal reality of what her husband and his buddies have been up to, and experience more suffering than her tweet about having misplaced her cars high end tire iron.
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It wouldnt make sense if any of the family or friends of team prenda weren't also completely nonsensical, after all
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