Court Suspends 'Copyright Troll' Lawyer From Practicing Law (torrentfreak.com) 39
Copyright lawyer Richard Liebowitz has been repeatedly sanctioned by federal courts. The controversial attorney has a long track record of disregarding court orders. To protect the public from future missteps, the grievance committee of the Southern District of New York has decided to suspend Liebowitz until further order.
At last! (Score:4, Insightful)
Some sane news in this insane future world.
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I hope it is a beginning of a trend.
We have fallen into an environment where trolls can do baseless lies about nearly anything and we feel like we need to take it in with equal credence as better factual information.
While a lawyer should be working their butt off for their customer to make sure they get the best they can get, they should also have limits with consequences, for abusing the legal system as well. The lawyer should be able to say, what the other guy is doing is legal, and we have no case, not
Re:At last! (Score:4, Informative)
This was after he was ordered to a pay $100,000 penalty, and inform all his clients that he'd been sanctioned for misconduct.
Oh I got something for this. (Score:5, Funny)
I was going to play him the world's saddest song on the world's smallest violin but he might mistake it for a public performance and try to sue me. Oh wait, I guess I'll play it after all. ;)
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I propose A Canticle for Leibowitz
“Pound pastrami, can kraut, six bagels—bring home for Emma.”
– Walter M Miller
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I was going to play him the world's saddest song on the world's smallest violin but he might mistake it for a public performance and try to sue me. Oh wait, I guess I'll play it after all. ;)
The swamp is deep and murky and full of terrors my friend, so I wouldn't start playing just yet....
*checks the calendar* (Score:5, Funny)
I'm confused. It is still 2020, right? I wasn't expecting any good news until next year.
Re:*checks the calendar* (Score:5, Funny)
Turns out that the Catholic monks in 1582 messed up the math, and the new year actually began on November 7th.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
In fact, the mid-winter new year originated as a fiscal year during the age of sail, when import/export warehouses wanted to do their annual inventory and accounting and such during the slowest part of their business year. (The winter holidays weren't yet so heavily commercialized at the time.)
Ignore any nonsense anyone tries to tell you about "Julian calendar reforms" in ancient Rome.
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must be the same monks that got celibate and celebrate confused
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There has been one tremendous good news this year. Yeah, you know exactly what I mean. If everything we've had to endure in 2020 was the price to pay for that, then it was all worth it.
Breaking COVID News (Score:5, Funny)
Rudy Giuliani has been rushed to Johns Hopkins Tire and Battery Center
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I don't normally laugh out loud, but when I do it's to stuff like this.
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I believe that you are talking about Trump loosing the Presidential Election. While I am Anti-Trump and I am happy to see he lost the election. I wouldn't really call it good news for 2020. Knowing quite well that it would only be Step 1 on getting him out.
With the news cycle, we are now anxious to watch every site formally certify electors, as Trumps Lawyers and Trump himself, tries to convince local governments to drop votes. This process is nearly done.
Then we have to see what happens with the actua
How corrupt has the American legal system become? (Score:2)
Should it be modded Off-topic? Or Insightful? Or does Slashdot need a Zen mod for spanning posts, in this case the bridge being the corruption of the American legal system? On that path it would be legitimate to consider the long-term consequences of the spasm of Trumpism?
Following that parth, it's obviously the Supreme Court that may cause the greatest damage. And in my typically perverse way, I look for a solution approach. How about favoring nonpartisan Justices? Minimal wrinkle would be to let each nonp
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I'm confused. It is still 2020, right? I wasn't expecting any good news until next year.
Did you miss this one? https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada... [www.cbc.ca]
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You thought 2020 bringing bad news meant 2021 would bring good news?
You may want to enjoy this good news while you can.
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Mod parent funnier.
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Obligatory The Onion [theonion.com] article.
The Germans had one of these as well (Score:5, Informative)
People living in Germany will probably remember "Günter Freiherr von Gravenreuth" who was the German equivalent. He was a copyright troll back in the 1980s and was an early adopter of the internet when it was introduced.
His downfall arose from his habit of trying to get people to pay licensing fees for various terms, a smaller newspaper decided to cover themselves and pay the fee. He took the money and sued them anyway, forgetting that they had paid. Now they got the lawyers out and when all was said and done, he was sentenced for fraud and lost his right to practice law.
In addition he was sentenced to 14 months inside. When it came to the point he was going to have to serve his sentence, he sent an email out saying he had family, health and financial problems, and shot himself.
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Yep, I remember Guenni. When I read that he committed suicide, my first thought was "good riddance",
Better late than never. (Score:1)
" When it came to the point he was going to have to serve his sentence, he sent an email out saying he had family, health and financial problems, and shot himself."
Better late than never. Many toxic humans are beyond reformation or enlightenment. He died like a coward vs. taking a comfy 14 months in a German jail then taking advantage of their welfare state and retiring. He was greedy, weak, evil and stupid in one vile package.
The misery these people cause to society is worse than an individual violent crim
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contempt of court (Score:2)
contempt of court
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Re:contempt of court (Score:5, Informative)
The order was specifically about his law license, and seems to be the start of what could ultimately be a very expensive end to his law career. Of the 113 failed notifications:
- 12 cases that Mr. Liebowitz says he missed "because [he] did not search the districts in which the cases are pending . . . or simply missed the case in the lists generated by Pacer following [his] original searches,"
- 5 cases that PACER listed as "closed" but that still had motions pending and for which Liebowitz "subsequently realized" he "should have filed the June 26 Order,"
- 62 cases "that were ‘pending’ as of the date of the June 26 Order but were not ‘pending’ as of July 27, 2020 because such cases had been settled, dismissed, or terminated in a default judgment between June 26, 2020 and July 27, 2020,"
- 18 cases in which Mr. Liebowitz "believed that [he] was no longer counsel of record and therefore not required by the June 26 Order to file the Order," but for which he "subsequently recognized that filing was in fact required,"
- 11 cases "in which [Mr. Liebowitz] had not entered a formal appearance in the case, or lacked filing credentials,"
- 5 cases that are "connected to LLF because LLF has a retainer agreement with the client, and LLF likely discovered the infringement," but for which "(1) neither [Liebowitz] nor LLF initiated the case, (2) neither [Liebowitz] nor LLF entered a notice of appearance in the case, and (3) the case is being handled by a third-party lawyer."
Some of these could be arguable, and the order admits that ("Mr. Liebowitz identifies 113 cases in which he was required (or was at least arguably required) to file the Opinion and Order but had nevertheless failed to do so"), but the first, where he relied on a PACER search to find out which cases were his, was especially likely to annoy the judge, and Liebowitz should have asked for clarification given the large number of other cases potentially involved. He might have been able to limit the number of notifications and keep his practice, at least for a time, but asking this much forgiveness at once is too much.
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Not even his law license, which is issued by the state of New York. This just prevents him from appearing in federal cases in the Southern District of New York.
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while there are exceptions, other jurisdictions tend to enter reciprocal sanctions.
hawk, esq.
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Eh, we'll see. And until THAT disciplinary process concludes, he can still practice...
That pic (Score:4, Insightful)
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Impending Lawful Masses Video in 3... 2... 1... (Score:2)
Disbarment is that hard? (Score:2)
Oh good (Score:3)
Now he'll go on social media and tell everyone how he was silenced by the Liberally-biased courts.
Hey, he might have a future in politics.
Leonard French's Youtube series (Score:1)
Leonard French has a great series of Youtube videos covering this guy's shenanigans: https://www.youtube.com/playli... [youtube.com]
He reads through and explains the new suspension order here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]