Roca Labs Threatens Other Sites For Writing About Its Case, Files Another Questionable Document

from the just-keep-digging dept

The saga of Roca Labs continues. If you're unfamiliar with it, I recommend reading the previous stories, rather than having me rehash it here, but the Florida company, which makes a substance that it claims will help people lose weight is suing PissedConsumer.com because Roca gets many of its customers to agree to a questionable clause barring any negative statements about the product, and Roca claims that PissedConsumer's encouragement of negative reviews is somehow tortious interference. Roca also has a history of threatening lots of people with defamation claims, including all three former customers who came forward as witnesses in the PissedConsumer case... and us at Techdirt for merely covering the case and quoting some of the filings. There was also this weird tangent involving a failed accusation that PissedConsumer's lawyer, Marc Randazza tried to "bribe" a state Senator (that got tossed out pretty quickly).

Apparently, though, Roca Labs just keeps threatening people for covering the case. We've heard from a few others who received similar threats to the one we received, and the latest is Tracy Coenen, a fraud investigator who writes the Fraud Files blog, where she covered the Roca lawsuit, the lawsuit against a former customer and the fake implied endorsement from Alfonso Ribeiro.

Apparently, Roca's "independent general counsel" Paul Berger didn't like that, and sent her a legal nastygram last week, claiming that she made "numerous false and defamatory statements." Coenen has now responded to Berger's letter, declining to retract the original, noting that the statements in question are either statements of opinion, quotes from the pleadings in the case or factual statements.

At this point, I'm just kind of curious as to why Berger thinks this particular strategy is effective. Is it just the only remaining hammer in his toolbag, and thus every bit of coverage looks like a nail he has to bang?

In the meantime, the case continues with yet another new lawyer representing Roca (I've lost track of how many there have been). The latest lawyer, James Hetz, who also lists himself as "independent general counsel" for Roca Labs (how many of those do they have?) recently filed a statement that the PissedConsumer case "IS NOT related to any pending or closed civil or criminal case filed with this Court or any other Federal or State court..."

That struck me as somewhat interesting, given a blog post from lawyer Ron Coleman last week, in which he revealed that... before Roca had sued PissedConsumer in Florida, PissedConsumer had actually sued Roca Labs for declaratory judgment in New York, after Roca had begun sending PissedConsumer threatening letters demanding it remove all those negative reviews (and apparently claiming, hilariously, it had "suffered damages in excess of $40 million" from the negative reviews). According to the docket on that case, Roca Labs is trying to get it dismissed for lack of jurisdiction, but otherwise the case is proceeding. Given that these appear to be about the very same issue, I'm not sure how the Roca Labs filing in Florida by Hetz is an accurate statement.






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Filed Under: defamation, james hetz, paul berger, pissedconsumer, threats, tracy coenen
Companies: consumer opinion corporation, pissedconsumer, roca labs


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  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 5 Nov 2014 @ 3:23pm

    Perhaps Roca Labs keeps promising these lawyers results that they can't deliver on, based on a strange assortment of legal theories in their patented legal formula.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Spyder, 5 Nov 2014 @ 3:32pm

      Re:

      ... and those lawyers can't tell other lawyers about their lack of results because they signed the "non-disparagement" agreement...

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Adam Steinbaugh (profile), 5 Nov 2014 @ 3:23pm

    Empty frame

    Nobody ever sends me any mail. :'(

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      That Anonymous Coward (profile), 5 Nov 2014 @ 6:39pm

      Re: Empty frame

      *breaks out the crayons*
      you want a puppy or a kitty?

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      G Thompson (profile), 5 Nov 2014 @ 11:47pm

      Re: Empty frame

      The problem is you went the full opinion and linked them with Ms Cox first.

      You should of waited and gotten your hatemail first :)

      Though I remember a certain Mr white getting jealous because he never was mentioned nor became a party to the Rakofsky debarcle LOL ... so don't fret to much

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Adam Steinbaugh (profile), 5 Nov 2014 @ 3:27pm

    Also fun

    They must be planning on sending out a LOT of nastygrams if they're looking to hire another attorney.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    steell (profile), 5 Nov 2014 @ 6:02pm

    Let me see if I understand this correctly.
    We have this company, that appears to be run by some institutionalized individual(s), begging for more rope with which to hang themselves?

    And their opponent(s) is/are represented by renowned 1st Amendment Lawyer Marc Randazza?

    Reminds me of swatting flies with a sledgehammer, those poor fools.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    That Anonymous Coward (profile), 5 Nov 2014 @ 6:39pm

    In which someone finally attempts to disprove that any press is good press.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Get off my cyber-lawn! (profile), 5 Nov 2014 @ 10:01pm

    Oh, I'm sorry your honor

    I didn't realize we were expected to file TRUTHFUL filings.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    jackn, 6 Nov 2014 @ 7:01am

    "the Fraud Files blog"

    I wish this site was usable. I was interested in the content, but the design is so poor, one can not even see the content.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Tracy, 6 Nov 2014 @ 1:21pm

      Re:

      Can you tell me what you mean? I am not aware of any design problems, but would correct them if you could be more specific.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 6 Nov 2014 @ 11:09am

    Small world...

    Sequence Inc. is located not too many blocks from where I work.

    link to this | view in chronology ]


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