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Caldera Government It's funny.  Laugh. The Courts News

SCO's Lawsuit Gets Even Crazier 179

I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "With SCO in Chapter 11 bankruptcy and there being little to read other than status reports and the boring financial details of how the company is wasting its last few dollars, one could be excused for thinking the SCO lawsuits had lost their zip. But things just got a bit more interesting. Jonathan Lee Riches has asked the court to take over. Yes, the man also known as inmate #40948-018 is now bringing his legal experience to the table, having previously filed pro se lawsuits against such entities as Michael Vick, Michael Jordan, Mickey Mantle, the Lincoln Memorial, the Thirteen Tribes of Israel, 'Various Buddhist Monks,' Mein Kampf, Denny's, George W. Bush, the Soviet Gulag Archipelago, Bellevue Hospital, Iran's Evin Prison, Auschwitz, and Plato. In his hand-written pro se motion (PDF), he asks to intervene as Plaintiff pursuant to FRCP 24(a)(2). As best anyone can read the motion, it appears that he offered Novell some 'royalty payments' and they refused them, so he wants to protect his UnixWare rights. He also claims to have proof of SCO's claims, but he wants take over part of the case via FRCP 24 because SCO isn't competent, and allegedly he could do a better job. To be fair, between him and Darl, it's something of a toss-up."
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SCO's Lawsuit Gets Even Crazier

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  • Denny's or George W. Bush?
  • Hmm.. (Score:5, Funny)

    by The Ancients ( 626689 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @03:29PM (#24202593) Homepage

    To be fair, between him and Darl, it's something of a toss-up."

    "Toss up"? You got that right.

  • Translation of PDF (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Gewalt ( 1200451 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @03:29PM (#24202597)
    It reads: "It's cold in here, and I'm lonely."
    • by spun ( 1352 )

      My favorite JLR quote:

      "Philip Woolston and Apple Computers sexually assaulted me in my dreams and not in real life, I can't sue a dream."
       

    • by Otter ( 3800 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @03:52PM (#24203039) Journal
      Translation of this story: "Hey, let's laugh at that mentally ill person!"
      • by cyphercell ( 843398 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @04:04PM (#24203209) Homepage Journal
        are you sure? Maybe the mentally ill person is wondering why sco gets away with it and he doesn't? Honestly, if we were to admit he were mentally ill he wouldn't belong in prison, if he's not ill then surely he jests.
        • by jd ( 1658 ) <imipakNO@SPAMyahoo.com> on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @05:31PM (#24204593) Homepage Journal
          The odds are near-certain that he is ill to some degree, and fairly high that he's ill enough to have had some sort of split with reality. Clearly not completely, if he's wanting to sue Denny's, but nonetheless significant. I've always thought that it would make more sense to split prison sentences into a penal phase actually in a prison, and a mental phase where the person is in a suitable facility that has comparable security and restrictions (ie: not a "soft option") but is primarily concerned with treating mental conditions.

          The primary idea would be that you would then dispense entirely with the insanity plea, regard ALL who are convicted as needing some mental health care, and split the time accordingly. This means that all who actually do need treatment get it, and those who don't get a thorough health check, so nobody would lose. This would also eliminate the usual problem of the prosecution and the defense hiring mental health "experts" that look for what they want to see, and the whole problem of 'criminal insanity'. Such a concept would have no meaning, if all insanity gets treated and no insanity is punished. You'd have to be extremely careful to keep it to genuine help rather than control, but I don't see that as an impossibility.

          The secondary aspect is that if some people get the mental health checks first, you might reduce prison violence and prison ganglands. If these attitudes can be attacked effectively, it has to be outside an environment they think they can rule. There is something macho to those guys about being in prison, it's even a medal of honor to some. I don't think they'd get quite that machismo kick out of being in a padded room with doctors who are going to utterly ignore their ravings.

          Of course, this means you would need to build highly secure mental homes capable of handling three or four million people, have sufficient medical facilities in each to test and treat as necessary, and sufficient experts in the field to actually handle the volume of work. I'm not sure what 9.4T MRI scanners cost these days, but you really need to get to that resolution to diagnose anything other than the most coarse-grained of stuff. Nor do I know how much the highest resolution CAT, PET, fMRI and EEG systems cost. However, I don't imagine the full works for every major population center would cost more than a few tens of trillions of dollars in total. A hundred trillion at the outside. Not sure the return would come close to that, which is a pain, but it might finally kill the Wild West attitude towards justice that is found in so many countries, and that would be a Good Thing at almost any price.

          The biggest drawback to this speculation is that quite possibly I'm the only one on the planet who thinks along these lines.

          • by Gilmoure ( 18428 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @05:56PM (#24205045) Journal

            What was that about Denny's again?

          • I'm not sure what 9.4T MRI scanners cost these days, but you really need to get to that resolution to diagnose anything other than the most coarse-grained of stuff.

            Correct me if I'm wrong, but you don't use magnets that strong on humans. The most powerful clinical MRI I've seen is 3T. (Granted I haven't paid attention in a few years, but still, 9.4T is quite a lot.)

            • by jd ( 1658 )
              Admittedly, it IS in Chicago [sciencedaily.com], so I cannot vouch for the humans getting back out again, but if worked as described by the researchers involved [uic.edu], the system is capable of resolving down to individual neural connections.
          • There's a slight problem with this idea, in that involuntary mental health institutions have a habit of completely ignoring what is typically considered ethical treatment of prisoners. Everything from keeping a person perpetually restrained (A major violation of international law) to simple stuff like denying a prisoner access to reading materials and visitation rights.

            There are certainly reasons to do all this, in extreme cases, but I wouldn't subject anyone to the nutjobs that run the madhouses if it was

            • by jd ( 1658 )
              You are absolutely correct, which means that if such a system were to ever be implemented - at least, ethically - it would need to be thoroughly monitored and outright prohibited from imposing restrictions that could not be imposed in prison under identical circumstances, and limited further from imposing constraints that were mentally damaging, with limited exceptions for when that really is the only option. You'd also need staff who regarded their work in the same light as the truly dedicated and most eth
          • by KGIII ( 973947 )
            If you want the long story I'll share it with you but I'll give you the short of it. The justice department is not, and has never been, about rehabilitation. It is retribution. It is not about resolving, it is about warehousing inmates at the lowest possible cost.
            • by jd ( 1658 )
              I think you are correct, and I think that that is part of why the reoffense rate is high, but also why over 1% of the population is now in prison. My suggestion may be a dead-end, but the current system is undead and terminal. Holy water and garlic may also be helpful.
              • by KGIII ( 973947 )
                My thoughts? Stop sending them into a prison and start putting them either nowhere, a facility that keeps them all separate, or into a facility that actually helps them. In order: Some crimes don't need to remove the perpetrator from society - see possession of drug charges or the likes. Separated means that they are less likely to continue with criminal conduct and able to control the outside - should be only the rarest of cases where, say, capital punishment is in order. If there is going to be a "release
                • by jd ( 1658 )
                  Realistic or not, I like your thoughts and ideas a lot. We live in a world where destructive thinking is more popular than constructive, but I urge that you don't let that stop you thinking about the ways society can be better. At worst, it is a great outlet for what bubbles through the innermost parts of your mind. At best - well, once every hardly ever, a really good idea gets heard by someone who decides to make it happen, or at least borrows the key ideas. It's too rare to be motivated by it, but it's o
        • Right, because no mentally ill people have ever gone to prison!

      • by _KiTA_ ( 241027 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @04:21PM (#24203499) Homepage

        Translation of this story: "Hey, let's laugh at that mentally ill person!"

        If I was stuck in jail for 10 years, I'd be doing the same thing -- sucking as MUCH money out of the system as possible, just for something to do. Plus they might let him out to shut him up.

        • by Tom ( 822 )

          If I was stuck in jail for 10 years, I'd be doing the same thing -- sucking as MUCH money out of the system as possible, just for something to do. Plus they might let him out to shut him up.

          Either that, or he's good a weird sense of humour. I could imagine that he actually enjoys the stuff, and has fun doing it.

          • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

            by LrdDimwit ( 1133419 )
            It's not unheard of for inmates to do this kind of thing -- repeatedly file frivolous lawsuits. See, prisoners are indigent, so they get to sue basically for free, but they can *see* the havoc they cause on everyone else who has to deal with their mess. What do they care, they're in jail for the rest of their life anyway. What have they got to lose?

            Giving them access to the courts is done on purpose, to prevent excesses in the prison system. (Not that this is particularly effective, but that's the the
      • Darl may be mentally ill, but I can't be the only one withholding judgement on his status as a member of the human race until someone pays for independent review.

        Of course, the very job of auditing Darl for evidence of humanity brings to mind the joke about lawyers v. labrats ('there are some things even a rat won't do').

        Oh, you meant the cellmate?... um, Nevermind... </emily>

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by Manchot ( 847225 )
        I don't think that he's mentally ill. He files these lawsuits in different federal districts in order to avoid frivolity penalties. In other words, he recognizes that the suits are completely ridiculous. I bet that he's doing it because he's bored.
      • by fermion ( 181285 )
        Timmy!
      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by johkir ( 716957 )
        Or, "Let's laugh WITH that (mentally ill) person!"
    • "...and I hear stuff..."

  • Shawshank (Score:5, Funny)

    by bugs2squash ( 1132591 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @03:30PM (#24202619)
    All because Andy Dufresne just had to build that damn law library...

    Oh wait - I'm failing to separate fact from fiction...

    Oh wait...
  • Cellmates (Score:5, Funny)

    by rjshirts ( 567179 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @03:31PM (#24202645)
    I guess he and Darl can cook up theories in prison together about how IBM is secretly owning the world, and how they put a secret chemical into every keyboard to make you addicted to the internet.
    I mean, it's the next logical step in this case, isn't it?
    • But IBM is evil. Look what they did to Microsoft Open XML. Or how they gave punchcards to the Nazis...

    • by rpmayhem ( 1244360 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @04:53PM (#24204009)
      I knew there was a better reason why the IBM model M keyboards are so beloved.
    • by Monsuco ( 998964 )

      I mean, it's the next logical step in this case, isn't it?

      No, next he will probably say something crazy like Groklaw's PJ being a hoax and not really existing, oh wait...

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      how they put a secret chemical into every keyboard to make you addicted to the internet

      Darl: Mandrake, do you realize that flouridation of keyboards is the most monstrously conceived and dangerous Linux plot that we have yet to face? ... I cannot sit back and allow Linux infiltration, Linux indoctrination, Linux subversion, and the international Linux conspiracy to sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids.

  • ...ya just can't buy.

  • Fat chance. (Score:5, Funny)

    by WK2 ( 1072560 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @03:36PM (#24202721) Homepage

    Compared to SCO, this guy's lawsuit actually has a chance of succeeding.

  • by Anonymous Coward
    to pay your $299 (or was it $499) "get out of jail" fee, you ...
  • Toss up? (Score:3, Funny)

    by segedunum ( 883035 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @03:37PM (#24202739)
    Sound like a couple of tossers to me.
  • by gubers33 ( 1302099 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @03:52PM (#24203025)
    Granted the guy has totally went insane in prison, but in terms of his knowledge of the law he is probably more knowledgeable than SCO. If you read some of his other suits, the legal references are legit, but his plaintiffs and reasons for suing are completely off the deep end.
    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      Granted the guy has totally went insane in prison

      He's insane like Monty Python is insane. Totally insane is when you have to wear depends and take Thorazine shots daily. You shouldn't call things bricked that are salvageable. Boredom will make you do strange things.

  • Crazier! (Score:2, Funny)

    by geogob ( 569250 )

    SCO's Lawsuit Gets Even Crazier

    Well, now I, without a doubt, believe anything is possible. Perhaps even the most pessimistic being/thing in the universe would believe anything is possible after reading this line.

  • Plato's reponse (Score:5, Insightful)

    by mattjb0010 ( 724744 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @03:53PM (#24203059) Homepage
    In response, Plato said [brainyquote.com]: "Justice means minding one's own business and not meddling with other men's concerns."
  • IANAMP (Score:5, Interesting)

    by stomv ( 80392 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @03:58PM (#24203125) Homepage

    I am not a medical professional, but it sure seems that Jonathan Lee Riches is acting in ways that may be medically insane. The US Justice system doesn't exactly have a good track record when dealing with mental illness.

    If he is ill, I hope he gets treatment.

    • Insanity is not a medical criterion, it's a moral and legal one. The key is being capable of knowing the difference between right and wrong. Right and wrong are concepts fundamentally outside the mandate of medical science.

      see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insanity#In_medicine [wikipedia.org]

      If he's mentally ill then he certainly needs treatment. But that's actually an independent question from whether or not he's a moral agent who deserves to be held responsible for his actions (although one will often inform the other

  • by Jason Levine ( 196982 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @03:58PM (#24203127) Homepage

    Riches's imagination in making accusations is matched by his audacity in asking for damages. In the July 16 suit he demanded "211,429,399,000,000.00 trillion dollars backed by gold and silver, delivered by United States Postal Service."

    That's 211 septillion, 429 sextillion, 399 quintillion dollars. To compare, the world's GDP (as of 2006) was $65.95 trillion. So the guy wanted over 3.2 TRILLION percent of the world's GDP.

    On July 16, for instance, he filed a complaint alleging that the Mossad, the CIA and "Larry King Live" conspired to "hijack my torso, three toes, and my constitutional rights and ship them to a secret headquarters in Concord, NH," as well as inserted microchips and "dashing my hopes." He accuses Larry King of being "a voodoo witch doctor who stole my identity on February 25th, 2003 and purchased lead paint, Chips Ahoy!, Planter's Peanuts, and Ziploc bags under my identity. Distributed them to the CIA to microwave test my DNA."

    The guy's either a certified loon or someone trying to pass himself off as one. And these two small quotes are just two drops in the loony bucket. I hate to say it, but even Darl McBride's most fantastic quotes were closer to reality that this guy's quotes. Even though Darl didn't have anywhere near the evidence to back his claims, they were within the general realm of possibility. Larry King stealing this guy's identity to buy ziploc bags and passing them on to the CIA to "microwave test" his DNA? That makes Iraq's old Information Minister look like he was telling the complete truth.

    • Riches's imagination in making accusations is matched by his audacity in asking for damages. In the July 16 suit he demanded "211,429,399,000,000.00 trillion dollars backed by gold and silver, delivered by United States Postal Service."

      That's 211 septillion, 429 sextillion, 399 quintillion dollars. To compare, the world's GDP (as of 2006) was $65.95 trillion. So the guy wanted over 3.2 TRILLION percent of the world's GDP.

      And how is that crazier than the RIAA wanting $150,000.00 for each song "illegally shared" to compensate them for their "losses" - which also, using their figures for "song piracy", also works out to more than all the money in the world?

      • According to http://p2pnet.net/story/11575 [p2pnet.net] , there are about one billion songs shared per day on P2P networks. If the RIAA demanded $150,000 for each song shared, that would come to $150 trillion per day, or $54,750 trillion dollars. This is just under the world's GDP and is much less than this guy's demands. Plus, the RIAA isn't demanding that entire figure from a single person/entity. So while the RIAA is still quite far from reality, they are still closer to it than this guy. I'm officially impresse

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      The guy's either a certified loon or someone trying to pass himself off as one.

      Honestly? His claims sound a lot like the religious tomes of Scientology.

      Maybe he's bored, or waiting for the mother ship?

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by Chris Burke ( 6130 )

      That's 211 septillion, 429 sextillion, 399 quintillion dollars. To compare, the world's GDP (as of 2006) was $65.95 trillion. So the guy wanted over 3.2 TRILLION percent of the world's GDP.

      Geeze, why not just go all the way and ask for "infinity U.S. dollars, in non-sequential bills"

      • An infinite number of non-sequential bills? Doesn't that contradict the continuum hypothesis or something? :-)

        • Well, I added it to try to add an extra level of crazy on top of asking for infinity dollars so I hadn't really thought of it. But I guess if you could do infinity dollars, that would actually be possible. 1... 3... 5... repeating to infinity would count for the sense of "non-sequential" I meant, and is still an infinite set.

      • I was actually wondering if he was holding his pinky to his mouth, Dr. Evil style, while writing out his demands.

        "I want two hundred SEPT-ILLION dollars!"

    • "Larry King stealing this guy's identity to buy ziploc bags and passing them on to the CIA to "microwave test" his DNA? "

      Maybe he's not so wacky.

      I read this as a kind of political performance art. He is making a statement that sails "Here is just one more law suit not un-like the millions you've seen before." And you know what? He's right. No so different really.

      Kind of like the guy barfs on a canvas and says it's "art". He is making a statement about how stupid and gullible some art critics and buyers

      • Actually, I think another poster hit the nail on the head. The guy's in a federal prison for 10 years. This whole campaign is to make him appear mentally ill so he can be transferred to a nice hospital where they will treat his "ailment" instead of him having to do hard time.

    • That's 211 septillion, 429 sextillion, 399 quintillion dollars. To compare, the world's GDP (as of 2006) was $65.95 trillion. So the guy wanted over 3.2 TRILLION percent of the world's GDP.

      What? don't try to pretend like you don't...

    • by Chrisq ( 894406 )

      That makes Iraq's old Information Minister look like he was telling the complete truth.

      You saying he wasn't. In today's politically correct world that makes you a racist.

    • Riches's imagination in making accusations is matched by his audacity in asking for damages. In the July 16 suit he demanded "211,429,399,000,000.00 trillion dollars backed by gold and silver, delivered by United States Postal Service."

      That's 211 septillion, 429 sextillion, 399 quintillion dollars. To compare, the world's GDP (as of 2006) was $65.95 trillion. So the guy wanted over 3.2 TRILLION percent of the world's GDP.

      Looking at it by another angle: At roughly 1,000USD per troy ounce of gold (Or 31,000 USD per kg), this makes (dropping lots of decimal places, just a rough estimate) around a tenth of our moon's mass. Or about 5*10^13 times all gold ever mined on Earth.

      Considering the density of gold, this would result in a sphere with a diameter of about 870km. Cool. (That's no moon, that's your opponent's payment...)

      I leave figuring out the postage for the delivery as an exercise to the reader ;-)

  • He's shooting in hopes of hitting. It's insane claims, but he has faith in the justice system that he will eventually hit a judge that matches his insanity and rules in his favor.

    What? You don't think loonie judges exist? You have seen the copyright lawsuits and still question their existance?

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by db32 ( 862117 )
      I suspect you are right for the wrong reason. Serving 10 years in prison is what he is facing, for identity theft. Getting declared legally insane and shipped off for treatment I suspect would be a really nice way to get out of prison rape and the other joys of being incarcerated. I could be wrong, I don't know much about the guy, but somehow I suspect with his identity theft crimes and knowledge of law that he probably isn't a toughguy thug apt to make it through 10 years of prison without his asshole b
      • by KGIII ( 973947 )
        *sighs* I can't/won't respond to you all with that thought process. The time it took to create the suits and submit them is quite a bit. He's due to be released in 2012 meaning he's been in jail for a long time now (10.5 years is his total bid.) At this point I can reasonably guess that he's not doing it in an attempt to get to a different facility. There are far easier ways to accomplish that including just asking and saying you are in fear of your life and then screaming madly about the ants trying to eat
  • The hand written motion is a nice touch, but it would have been better written on toilet paper.
  • Even admitting to using or owning Unixware is like admitting to using or owning Windows ME. :)

    But anyway UnixWare used source code from open source products [wikipedia.org] the same ones used in Linux. So trying to claim that Linux stole SCO Unix code by comparing source code between Linux and SCO Unix aka UnixWare you'll end up finding code that SCO used as Skunkware in their version of Unix that is source code from many open source projects that also became part of Linux distros as well. So all you prove is that Linux is

    • by KGIII ( 973947 )
      I actively used Windows ME and was pleased with the results. There were six of us who had just the right combination of hardware, black candles, and chickens. We loved it. A lot. I should make a comment about you being an insensitive clod but, meh... It's ME, it is okay.
  • Tag request (Score:3, Funny)

    by RockMFR ( 1022315 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @04:40PM (#24203837)
    Please tag story "microwavetesting". Thanks.
  • Daryl won (Score:4, Insightful)

    by richmaine ( 128733 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @05:03PM (#24204181)

    The difference between this guy and Daryl is that Daryl won. No, he didn't win the lawsuits, but that's a small detail. He walked away from it all a rich man. He won. With our legal system, it is quite easy to win a suit and come away having lost money big time. It is also possible to loose a suit, while getting rich in the process, although that's not so easy a trick to pull. Daryl managed. I'm not at all sure Daryl is stupid. Crooked - yes; stupid - not so clear at all.

    JLR, on the other hand, is in prison.

    • by justleavealonemmmkay ( 1207142 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @06:05PM (#24205175)

      I aym iyn fulyl agreemenyt wityh yoyu.

    • by dbIII ( 701233 )
      It helps a lot if you are channelling the majority of the companies worth into legal fees for your own brother. Personally I think it was an old fashioned two man scam on SCO with IBM, linux and share price manipulation as the distractions to confuse the board while they leeched all the money they could out of the place.

      Making clients sit through a spoof James Bond short film with Darl as the hero would in the past be seen as potential mental illness but it is now most likely just a symptom of furthur evol

  • by gelfling ( 6534 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @07:04PM (#24205901) Homepage Journal

    Fucking Plato that rat bastid.

  • by PPH ( 736903 ) on Tuesday July 15, 2008 @07:31PM (#24206173)

    Playing the part of the Black Knight in Monty Python's Search for the Holy Grail.

    "None shall pass!"

  • Now he's using the Chewbacca defense.
  • ... this guy should run for President. Well if Bush did it....
  • Hey, the guy has his own article on Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]. Cut the guy some slack. How many of you are listed on Wikipedia??
    • Hey, the guy has his own article on Wikipedia. Cut the guy some slack. How many of you are listed on Wikipedia??

      It's not a question of being popular, it's a question of whether there are any secondary sources siting you. The guy has been in a few newspapers, and poof there's a wiki entry.

  • by quantumplacet ( 1195335 ) on Wednesday July 16, 2008 @07:18AM (#24210685)

    Really worth reading the Justia link in groklaw:
    http://news.justia.com/cases/jonathan-lee-riches/ [justia.com]

    This might be my favorite

    Plaintiff sued the Jena 6 for "Loss of My White Rights" and sought $100 million in white gold and the White House. Plaintiff alleged that defendants hung a white noose in his cell at FCI Willaimsburg, told the FCI Williamsburg dentists not to fix his white fillings, fed him tainted White Castle hamburgers, turn his cell mate into Snow White, called him the white Suge Knight, burnt him with Great Whites pyrotechnics, made him suffer whiteouts, gave him white phosphorus, subjected him to low white blood cell counts, and that Vanna White won't write. Defendants also allegedly turned plaintiff into a white collar criminal and sent Whitehouse prosecutors after his white skin.

    This guy is definitely hilarious and not crazy.

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