Judge Dismisses Copyright Lawsuit for 'Shaking Down' the Defendants

A District Court Judge from Virginia dismissed all the defendants represented by a lawyer on the consideration that he doesn't actually try to make justice, his only purpose being to earn a profit.

A court document shows Justice John Gibney was faced with a case in which an adult movie was downloaded from the file sharing client BitTorrent by the defendants.

After carefully revising the statements he came to the conclusion that not only the plaintiff failed to demonstrate the actual crime, but also he accused them of seeking an easy pay from the accused parties.

“The mere allegation that the defendants have used the same peer-to-peer network to copy and reproduce the Work (the name of the movie) – which occurred on different days and times over a span of two months – is insufficient to meet the standards of joinder set forth in Rule 20,” Gibney revealed.

“This course of conduct indicates that the plaintiffs have used the offices of the Court as an inexpensive means to gain the Doe defendants’ personal information and coerce payment from them. The plaintiffs seemingly have no interest in actually litigating the cases, but rather simply have used the Court and its subpoena powers to obtain sufficient information to shake down the John Does,” the judge added.

As a result of his statement, he dismissed the charges brought against all the defendants except for one, giving the plaintiff the opportunity to file individual complaints against those they wish to pursue.

“The plaintiffs’ conduct in these cases indicates an improper purpose for the suits. In addition, the joinder of unrelated defendants does not seem to be warranted by existing law or a non-frivolous extension of existing law,” he wrote.

On the other hand, according to TorrentFreak, Gibney scheduled a hearing for next week in which Wayne O’Bryan, the lawyer that represented the case, will have to give detailed explanations about the legitimacy of these pay-up-or-else lawsuits. If he'll be found to have violated federal rules he can expect a hefty fine.