Team Prenda May Be In Even More Trouble In Reopened Case

from the and-out-come-the-tricks dept

It would appear that more and more courts are coming to the full realization of the kinds of tricks it appears Team Prenda has been pulling over the past few years, and that means that the troubles for Team Prenda may be quickly adding up. The latest is that an old AF Holdings case in Minnesota, which had been voluntarily dismissed all the way back in October, was magically reopened back in June, as we discussed at the time. One of the interesting things we noted, was that the magistrate judge handling the case, Franklin Noel, demanded info on any settlements that Team Prenda received.

We hadn't checked in since then, but Team Prenda has been scrambling since then -- and a hearing is happening today -- on the matter. The local attorney who had handled the original case, Michael Dugas, tried to get out of it, and hand the case over to Paul Hansmeier, with Dugas claiming that he "no longer represents" AF Holdings, but Noel wasn't going to hear that. After all, he's investigating possible fraud from the time when Dugas was on the case. So, Noel sent a simple shut up and show up response to Dugas denying his request with no explanation very quickly.

Paul Duffy also raised various objections and then tried to delay the hearing -- but Noel more or less rejected that, pointing out that Duffy in his various roles seems confused about what's going on here and what role he's supposed to be playing. That is, Duffy raised objections "pro se" -- basically as an individual representing himself -- but Noel points out that Duffy isn't actually a party to the lawsuit, Prenda Law is, and a company can't represent itself pro se. Here's Noel:

Paul Duffy filed a pro se objection to the order scheduling the case-management conferences. But the Court did not order Duffy to appear. Although Duffy purports to be “the sole principle [sic] of Prenda Law, Inc.,” he has not entered an appearance on behalf of the corporation. A corporation cannot appear pro se; it must be represented by counsel.... Duffy is an attorney, but he has not been admitted to practice before this Court. He has not sought to be admitted pro hac vice or by special permission of the court...

Given all this, he completely dumps Duffy's pro se objections, striking them from the record, orders Duffy to show up anyway (by phone) as a representative of Prenda, and (of course) denies the attempt to postpone things.

And, finally, on Friday, Paul Hansmeier sent a letter rather than a formal filing to Judge Noel (officially coming from Hansmeier's sketchy class action lawsuit objection operation, "Class Justice"), flat-out whining about a letter that another lawyer had sent to the judge, highlighting many of Team Prenda's more questionable activities. There's a funny part in which Hansmeier -- who Judge Wright and others have clearly noted were part of the Team Prenda efforts -- complains that "Prenda" is entirely different and it's unfair to lump them together.

However, he does note that (as per the original order), the judge has been given all of the settlement communications between the various John Does -- and even suggests that the court should unseal them to show that the "'shakedown' narrative is a canard." And says that other courts "would benefit from learning how disingenuous the 'shakedown' narrative truly is." Of course, he doesn't mention anything about Alan Cooper or who actually signed the documents. And since that's a big part of this.... Either way, we'll see if Judge Noel agrees with Hansmeier soon -- but his actions to date certainly suggest that he's seen enough to recognize that something very, very questionable happened via his court.

Filed Under: alan cooper, franklin noel, john steele, paul duffy, paul godfried, paul hansmeier
Companies: af holdings, prenda, prenda law

More Sanctions Issued Against Team Prenda

from the get-those-appeals-warmed-up dept

Late last week we noted that Judge Edward Chen was becoming as suspicious of Team Prenda as Judge Wright, and so it didn't take long for Judge Chen to add to the pile of sanctions against the key players, this time ordering another $22,531.93 in legal fees to Joe Navasca. Judge Chen's order is short and to the point, making the case that the lawsuit itself was "frivolous and objectively unreasonable" on a variety of fronts:

• The forged signature of Alan Cooper: "the signature by Alan Cooper appears to have been a forgery, as Judge Wright concluded in his recent sanctions order." Chen notes that Prenda/AF Holdings denies this, but points out that their only argument against all of this is "sheer speculation.'
• The claim against Navasca "was not based on an adequate factual investigation." Chen points out how ridiculous it is that Prenda claimed Navasca was the likely culprit because he worked in tech support, noting "one does not need to be tech savvy in order to download information from a computer."
• "AF filed an emergency motion to compel... even though, at the time it filed the motion, Mr. Navasca's discovery responses were not even due yet."
• Judge Chen notes that Prenda/AF Holdings argued that the reason it tried to dismiss the case and get out of it was because of the Court's "undertaking ruling" against it, but if that were true, you'd think they would have asked the court to reconsider. Yet, as Chen notes: "AF filed an emergency motion to compel, see Docket No. 38 (motion), even though, at the time it filed the motion, Mr. Navasca's discovery responses were not even due yet."
• The whole argument about how Navasca spoliated evidence using CCleaner was a complete joke. Noting that Prenda "has offered no real support for this claim." And, worse, even though Prenda lawyers had been told by a judge to investigate "the purpose and effective of CCleaner" they, of course, did "not appear to have done anything" along those lines.
• The real kicker. Judge Chen notes the real reason that Prenda sought to dismiss the case: the absolutely devastating deposition of Paul Hansmeier in this Navasca case is what pushed Judge Wright over the edge in the central district of California, after Hansmeier put on a ridiculous performance and more or less cemented the clear point that Prenda was up to no good.

Given all that, it's not difficult for Judge Chen to add to the growing line of monetary sanctions against Team Prenda:

AF's motivation to bring suit is problematic given its apparent lack of standing. Furthermore, even if AF did have standing, the fact that someone may have illegally downloaded the copyrighted work does not justify AF's decision to sue Mr. Navasca specifically. As discussed above, the factual investigation done by AF prior to identifying Mr. Navasca as the alleged infringer was inadequate. Furthermore, as indicated by the findings made by Judge Wright in his case, AF does not appear to have been motivated to file suit in order to protect the copyrighted work at issue. Rather, AF's business model was to sue people for downloading pornography in order to coerce settlements.

For the above reasons alone, the "motivation" factor weighs strongly in favor of Mr. Navasca, and against AF. However, one final consideration has been offered by Mr. Navasca, which raises even more concern on the part of the Court with respect to AF's motivation. More specifically, Mr. Navasca has offered evidence – the Neville declarations – which indicate that persons affiliated with AF used the alias "sharkmp4" to post links on the Pirate Bay website to many of the copyrighted works in order to induce users to download the works so that they could then be sued for copyright infringement. This evidence corroborates Judge Wright's finding that the motivation for this and similar suits is to sue and coerce settlement.

As for Prenda swearing up and down that the Neville declaration is wrong, Judge Chen isn't buying it. If Neville is wrong, he points out, you'd think that Prenda would present some counter-evidence. But they don't, other than to try to attack Neville's reputation.

The Court acknowledges that AF has in its brief attacked the Neville declarations as unreliable on various grounds – for example, because the opinions contained therein are offered by an individual who has not been qualified as an expert; because the original declaration was secured by an attorney of purportedly questionable ethics; because the methodology employed is problematic; and because the opinions are qualified (e.g., finding it probable or likely that persons affiliated with AF were responsible). But notably, what AF has not done is offer any counterevidence such as a declaration from Mr. Steele in which he denies that he is "sharkmp4" or other evidence that AF did not take steps to induce users to download the subject works. This evidence could easily have been offered by AF as a part of its opposition brief. AF's failure to submit any factual denial under oath is telling.

The end result:

the Court grants Mr. Navasca's motion for fees and costs and awards fees in the amount of $19,420.38 and costs in the amount of $3,111.55. The total award is $22,531.93.

This is slightly lower than Navasca asked for. The court cut 5% off the amount requested, because of the possibility of some slight overlap with the work done by Navasca's lawyers, Nick Ranallo and Morgan Pietz, on other similar Prenda cases. Still, the bill for Team Prenda keeps rising.

Filed Under: edward chen, joe navasca, john steele, morgan pietz, nick ranallo, otis wright, paul duffy, paul hansmeier
Companies: af holdings, prenda, prenda law

Bad News Is Contagious For Prenda

from the for-the-weekend dept

Well, might as well leave some folks for the weekend with some more bad news for Prenda as covered by Joe Mullin at Ars Technica. Yesterday there was another hearing in the case in Northern California, in the case where Judge Edward Chen appears to be a few steps behind Judge Otis Wright in understanding what Prenda is up to, but is catching up fast. This is the Navasca case, and Paul Duffy is so busy dealing with the collapse (and potential further problems) with Prenda that he apparently forgot the hearing was on at all. When the court reached him by phone, he was apparently confused, saying he thought the hearing had been cancelled. But the key point was that the Judge clearly is realizing that Prenda/Duffy are making claims that don't make much sense.

"Frankly I don't see why fees should not be awarded here, given the findings obtained in this court as well as other courts, including Judge Wright's," he said. "This case proceeded without proof of standing. There were also questions about identifying Mr. Navasca as an infringer without sufficient investigation. Other assertions, like improper spoliation, were never proven or supported. Then there's the whole question of motivation. There's a serious question raised about the whole business model here... [about whether] this is a business model to generate income through coerced settlements. If there's a case that warrants fee shifting, this certainly seems to be one of them."

Duffy tried to talk his way out of all of this, insisting (yet again) that Navasca "engaged in spoliation of evidence" -- a claim that's been tried by Team Prenda multiple times and failed -- in large part because it's silly. Navasca had a registry cleaner, CCleaner, installed on his computer, since well before the whole Prenda thing, and the app serves to keep a computer running efficiently and keep it from getting bogged down. Beyond having the app, there's no evidence that it was used to delete any form of evidence. The court has already rejected it, but Duffy couldn't let it go. But that's a pretty weak thread to hang from.

When asked about a variety of other things, Duffy did the usual "deny, deny, deny" move. In particular, Chen pointed out the whole lack of standing given the likelihood of Alan Cooper's signature being forged:

"Here AF [Holdings] didn't even prove standing," said Chen. The judge was referring to the disputed copyright assignment at the root of the case. It was signed by Alan Cooper, a former property caretaker for John Steele, the man pointed to as a key Prenda player. Cooper later denied having signed the papers.

"That's very much in dispute," said Duffy. "It's a 'he said, he said' about the individual who signed AF Holdings' [assignment]. The individual did not challenge the signature until Mr. Steele ejected him from his property, then all of a sudden repudiated his signature. There is a factual issue about whether the person who signed it actually signed it. We believe he did."

"I've not seen a case yet where AF Holdings has been able to prove to any court's satisfaction that this was not a case of either identity theft or forgery or something of that nature," said Chen. "I know you dispute this on behalf of your client. Is there a case where you have prevailed on this issue?"

"There's not a case where we have not prevailed," insisted Duffy,

When in doubt, go for the double negatives, I guess... Anyway, there's a lot more at that link. Duffy also tried to attack the credibility of Delvan Neville, the computer expert who presented incredibly compelling testimony that John Steele or someone closely associated with him was uploading the files Prenda was suing over themselves. As the judge pointed out, however, Duffy failed to actually file anything in any case that factually disputes Neville's statements. All he did was whine about Neville as a person and his credentials. The judge appears to find the lack of any such factual filings noteworthy.

"You take on his declaration... you argue about it. You say his opinions are worthless, et cetera, et cetera, purely conjectural, they don't make logical or economic sense. [But] I don't see any factual matter submitted. You had a full two weeks to respond.

We eagerly await Judge Chen's ruling.

Of course, there was also another Prenda hearing today down in Arizona, where Judge G. Murray Snow has also been expressing quite a bit of skepticism. There, Prenda red shirt Steve Goodhue filed "answers" to some of the questions Snow asked, which we've embedded below, but as of this writing no other details of the hearing have come about. I'm sure we'll find something out in the next week or so...

Meanwhile, back in St. Clair County, Illinois, where Prenda had focused a bunch of their state court actions, Charter Communications is now asking the judge to award it $5,000 from Team Prenda to pay for the costs of having to deal with Prenda's invalid subpoenas in one of the LW Systems (another shell) cases.

Charter attorney Robert Sprague of Belleville wrote in a motion July 11 that the company has asked for reimbursement from plaintiff attorney Paul Duffy of Chicago after Gleeson ruled June 6 that the subpoena was invalid, but that its requests have been ignored.

Sprague’s motion also claims that Duffy has not provided notice that customer information Charter inadvertently provided due to the invalid Jan. 31 subpoena has been destroyed.

“Charter customer information, including name and address information, is ordinarily confidential and subject to the protection under the Cable Act,” the motion states. “Customer information cannot be produced absent a valid court order requiring Charter to provide it.

It may be slow, but it seems like the world may finally start to be closing in on Prenda...

Filed Under: edward chen, g. murray snow, john steele, otis wright, paul duffy, steve goodhue
Companies: af holdings, ingenuity 13, lw systems, prenda, prenda law

Team Prenda Keeps Trying To Convince Judges That The Lawyers Who Exposed Them Are The Real Scammers

from the nice-try,-guys dept

We've discussed in the past how Team Prenda loves to use the "I know you are, but what am I" defense, in which they accuse opposing counsel of doing all sorts of nefarious things to game the legal system -- something that they themselves have been accused of by multiple judges. In the past few days, two more examples popped up. The same day that John Steele was getting reamed by Judge Otis Wright, Steele submitted his latest "reply" to opposing attorneys Morgan Pietz and Nick Ranallo, arguing in vehement language that those two need to be sanctioned. Not surprisingly, Judge Wright didn't bother with that one at all, because it's ludicrous. The focus of the hearing made it clear that Steele's attempts to pretend that Pietz and Ranallo are concocting some sort of fraud is not convincing anyone. Still, it's hilarious:

The extent of the fraud that has been committed on this Court by Respondents [Pietz and Ranallo] is slowly, but steadily, emerging. The first category of fraud--failing to serve any of the pro se persons with any of the papers they have submitted over the course of this entire proceeding--has been definitively established by the papers before the Court; Pietz and Ranallo do not dispute they engaged in this fraud.

It goes on and on. Of course, it's almost all entirely bogus. Pietz and Ranallo do dispute that they engaged in fraud, because they didn't. They explained, quite clearly, that Steele clearly had knowledge of what was going on, and then proceeded to do a variety of things -- including deleting his email account -- to claim that he was not being served and was somehow unaware of the proceedings.

Meanwhile, in the Navasca case in Northern California -- where a similar set of events appears to be playing out for Team Prenda, as judge Edward Chen seems to be recognizing what Team Prenda is trying to pull -- Paul Duffy has filed a similar attack on Pietz and Ranallo, once again trying to argue that it's those pesky lawyers who should be sanctioned. This is the case where, as we'd mentioned, Brett Gibbs filed a deposition to show that Mark Lutz was lying about the claim that Gibbs sent him documents, which Lutz signed as "Salt Marsh" (if you don't know what this is about, click the link to dig into the details).

Duffy is arguing that this is all some scam by Pietz and Ranallo to pay off Gibbs to lie to get Team Prenda in trouble.

There are however, two aspects of Defendant’s Motion that are highly troubling and suggest that if any sanctions are appropriate they should be imposed upon Defendant’s counsel [Pietz and Ranallo]. First, counsel has produced a declaration of former Plaintiff attorney Brett Gibbs (the “Gibbs Affidavit”) that Defendant’s counsel appears to have procured through a quid pro quo, in which Defendant’s co-counsel would assist Gibbs financially in the matter under appeal from the Central District of California before Judge Wright in exchange for Gibbs’ agreement to provide the Declaration. Leaving aside for now the many ethical infirmities arising from an attorney who offers a declaration against his own client, disclosing privileged communications and confidences, for his own personal gain, Defendant’s counsel knows, or should know, that statements in the Gibbs Declaration are, at a minimum, directly contrary to Gibbs’ sworn statements in other proceedings. Defendant’s counsel fails to notify the Court of that fact. Defendant’s counsel has also failed to inform the Court that, the Monday after Gibbs dated his Declaration, he and his co-counsel in the Central District filed in the Central District of California a motion seeking to relieve Gibbs of the obligation for a sanction in the amount of approximately $101,650 for which he was jointly and severally liable. (A true and correct copy of that as Exhibit “A” hereto and made a part hereof). The only purpose of counsels’ otherwise-inexplicable stipulation in the Central District is that they agreed to file it with that Court in exchange for a declaration that suits their interests in this matter. Indirect payment for testimony, and counsel’s failure to point out that Gibbs’ current declaration directly contradicts his prior statements, is conduct that the Court should sanction, at minimum, by denying the Motion in its entirety.

Duffy also goes on to attack the EFF, as if a court -- in Northern California, no less -- is unfamiliar with the EFF or thinks of it as some sort of "vigilante group" as Duffy claims. I realize that Duffy is from Chicago, and perhaps isn't that aware of the EFF or its reputation, but pretending they're some crazy vigilantes just makes you look silly. Even folks who disagree with the EFF, for the most part, recognize the group's reputation and legal prowess. And, I'd imagine that goes doubly for judges in Northern California, EFF's home turf.

Defendant’s Motion is a dizzying accretion of conspiracy theories, invective and inadmissible evidence that betrays a motive on the part of his counsel other than representation of the Defendant. Indeed, Plaintiff is informed that Defendant’s counsel is a panel attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation (“EFF”), an anti-copyright vigilante group whose panel attorneys have filed dozens upon dozens of similar filings throughout the country. The EFF panel attorneys have taken to attaching mass numbers of filings and transcripts of other court proceedings as exhibits to their filings, apparently in an attempt to lend the appearance of legal and factual gravitas otherwise missing from their arguments.

The motion goes on to suggest, strongly, that Pietz and Ranallo (a) effectively "paid off" Gibbs and (b) tried to pressure Duffy/Prenda into a settlement by claiming that it would file Gibbs' deposition claiming Lutz lied if they didn't. According to Duffy, this was a form of professional misconduct in trying to "induce a settlement."

Oh yeah, in the middle of all that, he also tosses in a bit claiming that Gibbs' deposition -- which shows that Duffy's client flat out lied to the court -- is "not credible." The "proof"? Gibbs, in the deposition, claimed that he believed Salt Marsh was a person, yet in Paul Hansmeier's now infamous deposition in this same case, Gibbs represented Hansmeier, where Hansmeier denied that Salt Marsh was a person. Of course, this ignores the timing of all this. The "Salt Marsh" signature came well before that deposition. To get around this, Duffy claims that it's somehow incredible that Gibbs believed Salt Marsh was a person -- though, anyone who's been following this case knows that's not incredible at all. Hansmeier and Steele insisted to him that Salt Marsh was a person, according to Gibbs, and (as has since come out), Steele's sister's boyfriend was named Anthony Saltmarsh. So, why is it so crazy? Duffy then tries to claim that if Gibbs had (a) believed that Salt Marsh was a person back when the ADR was submitted, and then (b) heard Hansmeier claim otherwise months later, then Gibbs "had an obligation to do something" to "correct any misunderstanding." Of course, Duffy is now using pretzel logic, suggesting that Gibbs had a duty to sabotage his own side (at the time) by publicly stating that he had filed falsified documents. Yeah, that's not going to happen.

Basically, Duffy's filing shows just how obnoxious Team Prenda is. From all of the information and details from Judge Wright's order, it appears that Steele, Hansmeier and (to a lesser extent, Duffy) had Brett Gibbs handle all the dirty work, insisting that various things were legit, when it turns out they weren't. Now that it's come out that things weren't legit, Steele, Hansmeier and Duffy are effectively blaming Gibbs for taking their word on the documents it seems likely they falsified. Talk about chutzpah. "Your honor, we didn't commit fraud on the court, but if we did, the real blame should go towards the guy we used to commit the fraud, for not telling the court about the fraud he was a part of." Yes, that appears to be the basic argument.

These guys really are quite incredible.

Filed Under: brett gibbs, edward chen, john steele, morgan pietz, nicholas ranallo, otis wright, paul duffy, salt marsh
Companies: prenda, prenda law

Prenda Fails To Pay Filing Fee For Appeal, Now Owes $9,425 In Legal Fees

from the so-many-appeals-to-keep-track-of... dept

While the "big" Prenda appeal is in the central district of California, back in May, we noted that a ruling in the northern district had also said Prenda needed to pay legal fees to Nick Ranallo, in the amount of $9,425. Paul Duffy quickly appealed, but never paid the $455 fee for an appeal. He was warned a few weeks back that he needed to pay up, and still didn't, so the court has now dumped the appeal and locked in the $9,425 fee that Prenda is required to pay. Of course, if they're not even going to pay the $455 for the appeal, I'd imagine that it's going to be nearly impossible to get the $9,425. As we already know, Duffy has claimed that Prenda is winding down its operations... even as a nearly identical operation, with the same basic participants, but called the Anti-Piracy Law Group, sprung up in its place. How long until someone connects those two, and says that the attorneys fees owed can come from the latter as well?

Filed Under: appeals, attorney fees, fees, nicholas ranallo, paul duffy
Companies: af holdings, prenda, prenda law

Prenda Law Claims Its Winding Down Its Operations; Very Angry About Having To Pay Bond

from the keep-trying dept

With Judge Otis Wright telling Team Prenda to pay significantly more on the bond to cover Morgan Pietz's legal fees in the big case in California where Prenda got called out for what the judge suggested were racketeering violations, Paul Duffy and Prenda are fighting back in typical fashion. They've gone to the appeals court to whine about why they shouldn't have to pay, why Pietz shouldn't get any money and about all the reasons they think Judge Wright is wrong. But there's also an interesting tidbit in Duffy's affidavit:

Prenda Law is currently winding down its operations and is in the process of dismissing its remaining cases pursuant to the instructions of its clients.

It later says that Prenda Law has not filed any new copyright infringement cases in several months. Of course, this completely ignores the fact that Duffy and what appears to be basically the same crew of people immediately flipped the switch to a new firm, called the Anti-Piracy Law Group, which has continued to do the same basic shakedown game, even as they were being hit with sanctions and more for the same game under the Prenda label. Funny how Duffy leaves that part out...

Filed Under: bond, john steele, morgan pietz, paul duffy, paul hansmeier
Companies: af holdings, prenda, prenda law

Morgan Pietz Objects To Duffy's Bond In Prenda Case, Points Out More Typical Prenda Tricks

from the check-for-john-doe dept

We were a bit surprised that Prenda Law's Paul Duffy actually filed a bond to cover the amount that Judge Otis Wright ordered Team Prenda to pay in legal fees for their shenanigans. To date, Team Prenda seems to go out of its way to play games and to avoid doing what the court is actually asking, so it seemed like a bit of a departure to see them actually file a bond (if a few days late, and with some protest). But, apparently, we should never underestimate Prenda's game-playing.

The lawyer opposing them, Morgan Pietz, has responded to the bond asking the court not to accept it until a variety of changes are made, and which highlights the type of petty activity that Prenda is well known for engaging in. The most brazen, perhaps, is the fact that Duffy made the bond be in the name of "John Doe" for the unidentified client, but Pietz points out that, given that's not the Doe's real name, it's possible that they may get a check that can't be cashed. That's the kind of thing that has Prenda's name written all over it -- doing something that pretends to be helpful, when inside they're laughing about the "trick" they pulled on people.

That's not all. Duffy, in his filing, had said that Pietz had not been cooperative in having a "meet and confer" to agree on what the bond amount should be. But Pietz tells a very different story, and provides the email evidence.

The first undersigned counsel heard about a bond, or payment, from any Prenda party (with the exception of Mr. Gibbs; his motions will be addressed by separate response) was on Monday May 20, 2013, when Paul Duffy sent a short email on the subject, offering to post a bond in the amount of 125% of the amount awarded in the Sanctions Order. Undersigned counsel dutifully responded later that day (to all parties), outlining a number of concerns about the amount and conditions that should attach to a supersedeas bond, reiterating concerns raised in the appellate response papers regarding no stay of the non-monetary aspects of this Court’s order, and requesting that Prenda respond with their views on the substantive topics raised. Exhibit 1.

On May 21, 2013, this Court issued an Order Denying Ex parte Application for Stay of Enforcement ; Order to Show Cause Re Attorney’s-Fee Award. ECF No. 164. The next day, after close of business on May 22, 2013, still not having heard anything regarding payment or a bond, undersigned counsel again emailed all Prenda parties in another attempt to meet and confer regarding appeal bond details. Exhibit 1. In response to the May 22 query attempting to spur further discussion on the several points raised by undersigned counsel previously on the bond issue, Mr. Duffy wrote back “You had no substantive points. If you think of some and can articulate them coherently I would be glad to consider them. Thanks for thinking of me.” Id. Shortly after receiving Mr. Duffy’s foregoing email, undersigned counsel pointed out to everyone that such a response was not very helpful, and invited the rest of the Prenda parties to respond in substantive fashion. Nobody did. Mr. Duffy, however, did write the whole group one more time, in nonsensical and vaguely threatening fashion, to indicate that has apparently made a conscious decision to send undersigned counsel’s email messages to the SPAM folder. Exhibit 1

In case you can't look at the exhibit, the email that Duffy wrote back to Pietz -- which was clearly not an automated response -- was the following:

Thanks for your message Sir/Madam! Unfortunately, due to your inappropriate language and messages, which are within the access of my young children, I must place you in my "spam" filter. Unfortunately, I delete such messages daily without reading them. I wish you a speedy recovery, and make it a GREAT day!

Among the other problems with the bond, is that only Duffy has signed onto it, and as Pietz points out, since there are many different parties, each appealing separately, it's not at all clear as to what happens if some are exonerated, while others are found guilty. And, of course, Pietz argues that the amount is way too low, because it should take into account the likely cost of the appeal as well. Oh, and Pietz also wants it to be clear that Team Prenda can't get out of paying the bond by declaring bankruptcy.

Basically, it looks like Team Prenda simply can't resist playing its games -- once again, seeming to think that it's so much smarter than everyone else, that it can run verbal rings around those exposing their efforts.

Update: And... Judge Wright has just basically agreed with Pietz, conditionally granting the bond, but only if Duffy makes a bunch of changes to deal with the claims that Pietz brought up, and also says they need to add another bond for $135,933.66, to get the total up to $237,583.66 which is the amount Pietz argued was proper given the circumstances.

Filed Under: bond, john steele, meet and confer, morgan pietz, otis wright, paul duffy
Companies: af holdings, prenda, prenda law

New Filing Presents Evidence That John Steele Uploaded Videos To BitTorrent Himself

from the johnny-boy's-in-trouble dept

If you thought Graham Syfert was done with taking on John Steele and Prenda law with the closing of the Sunlust case in Florida, you'd be wrong. Today he's filed an incredible filing not just hitting back at Prenda in another case, First Time Videos vs. Paul Oppold, and asking for attorney's fees, but also including an affidavit from an actual expert (i.e., not a Prenda-style "forensic" expert) named Delvan Neville, who lays out in astounding detail how it's almost certain that John Steele himself uploaded the various videos to BitTorrent that were then used to sue various defendants for either "hacking" or copyright infringement. Oh, and in doing so, Steele appears to have made some choices that are pretty damning, including suggesting that he set up the file to effectively broadcast that it was free for the taking. In other words, there's an incredibly strong argument that the release of the file on BitTorrent was very authorized.

The work builds on some earlier research that Syfert has put out exploring how many of the Prenda-related films seemed to have been initially offered on The Pirate Bay via the same user: sharkmp4. For all the mocking that people have made concerning Prenda's "forensic" investigations into those they accuse of infringement (i.e., finding an IP address and not much else), Neville shows you how an actual investigation is done. You should read the whole thing for the layers upon layers of evidence that all seem to point the finger at John Steele.

Among other things, sharkmp4 seemed to be able to post these works on The Pirate Bay before the works were even mentioned anywhere else, and in at least one case, "sharkmp4" put a video up on The Pirate Bay three days before Prenda shell company Ingenuity 13 had even filed for the copyright. On top of that, the "forensics" company that Prenda uses -- which is supposedly run by Paul Hansmeier's brother Peter, but which had its domain registered and controlled by (you guessed it) John Steele -- apparently identified "infringements" almost immediately after the videos were placed on The Pirate Bay -- meaning they were likely looking for such infringement in conjunction with the upload.

At the end, however, Neville pulls together really damning evidence, tying together a website set up to distribute Ingenuity 13 porn films with the same exact IP address that was confirmed as being used by John Steele to log into his own GoDaddy account, highlighting how Steele -- or someone with access to his logins -- clearly has full access and control over Ingenuity 13 works. As you read through all of the evidence it appears highly likely that Steele is in control of Ingenuity 13, despite all his protests to the contrary.

As the filing notes:

Prenda Law's business structure is such that it is pirate, forensic pirate hunter, and attorney. It also appears that Prenda Law also wants to/has formed/is forming a corporate structure where it is: pornography producer, copyright holder, pornography pirate, forensic investigator, attorney firm, and debt collector. Other than the omission of appearing in the pornography themselves, this would represent an entire in-house copyright trolling monopoly- not designed to promote their own works for distribution and sale, but to induce infringement of their works and reap profits seen from mass anti-piracy litigation.

It remains to be seen if the court bothers to explore this, but I would imagine that it may be of interest in other Prenda and related cases.

Filed Under: delvan neville, graham syfert, john steele, paul duffy, paul hansmeier, paul oppold
Companies: af holdings, first time videos, ingenuity 13, prenda, prenda law

Prenda's Former Porn Client Comes Forward About His Fears Of Working With Prenda

from the look-at-that dept

Claire Suddath, writing for Bloomberg Businessweek, has written up a pretty comprehensive article about John Steele, Paul Hansmeier and Prenda Law. If, for some reason, you haven't been following this story through all the blog posts, Suddath's article is a pretty good way to catch up on the basics. There are a lot of little things left out, but most of the key points are mentioned. There is one interesting new bit of info in there, which is that Suddath spoke to one of Steele and Hansmeier's earliest porn clients (back before they switched to only suing on behalf of shell companies controlled by people associated with Steele and Hansmeier), Paul Pilcher of Hard Drive Productions. Pilcher explains that his deal with Steele and Hansmeier was a 50/50 split on any revenue gained, and that Steele and Hansmeier took care of everything, such that he had no idea about the various lawsuits. He just cashed the checks.

The money started rolling in. "They would send me a check for, let's say, $35,000, for a month," Pilcher says. "They'd be pounding their chest and jumping up and down, thinking they were the greatest in the world." Over a year and a half, Steele and Hansmeier filed a total of 65 suits on behalf of Hard Drive against 4,760 people, according to court documents. Pilcher earned just under $200,000, he says, but he never knew what was happening with the suits, how many there were, or who exactly his company was suing. "Getting information out of [Steele and Hansmeier] was honestly kind of painful," he says. "They claimed they didn't want me to have records of specific things in case something happened."

Now that's interesting. Have you ever heard of lawyers telling their own clients that they don't want the client to have records of lawsuits filed by that client "in case something happened"? Wow. Pilcher accepted this, even after courts started ruling against Prenda.

In early 2012, Hard Drive was sued twice for harassing plaintiffs to settle claims. Prenda took care of everything—Pilcher didn't even have to show up in court—but he started to wonder what his lawyers were up to. "I got very uncomfortable feelings from them," he says. "But I figured, Well, if there are judges involved, and they're ruling for us, and money is coming in, then it must be OK."

Now, Pilcher seems to realize that getting in bed with Steele and Hansmeier was a big mistake, and recognizes that lawyers may be gunning for him next.

The prospect of thousands of other people doing the same, or worse, terrifies Pilcher, although his Hard Drive Productions stopped working with Prenda last fall. "If these guys fold, I don't know if I'll have people coming out of the woodwork to sue or countersue," he says. "I'm obviously legally exposed."

Seems like an important lesson for other content providers thinking of going into the trolling game. It can come back to bite you. In the meantime, I wonder if Judge Wright or others might be interested in hearing some details from Pilcher about his experiences working with Steele and Hansmeier.

Filed Under: john steele, paul duffy, paul hansmeier, paul pilcher
Companies: hard drive productions, prenda, prenda law

Paul Duffy Does, In Fact, File A Bond To Cover Fees In Prenda Case

from the surprise,-surprise dept

Well, it took a while before it showed up in the court's electronic system, but it appears that Paul Duffy did, in fact, get a bond, for $101,650, to cover the amount that Prenda has been told to pay. As you may recall, the various lawyers associated with Team Prenda tried to file for a stay (first, erroneously by going straight to the appeals court), which Judge Wright rejected, adding $1,000 per day / per person additional fines to the total amount. While Brett Gibbs pleaded poverty, it appears that Duffy was able to get the bond. For the time being, this means that the amount owed won't keep increasing day by day. Duffy appears to have secured the bond back on the 16th of May, but only filed it with the court on the 23rd, three days after the amount was technically due. Of course, in his filing, he still takes cracks at opposing lawyer Morgan Pietz, suggesting that he and Pietz could not agree on the proper amount for the bond. Update: As some have noted, Duffy's bond covers everyone... except for Brett Gibbs. They really threw him under the bus something fierce.

Filed Under: brett gibbs, john steele, morgan pietz, otis wright, paul duffy, paul hansmeier
Companies: af holdings, ingenuity 13, prenda, prenda law