Colorado (Jason Kotzker): 23

DC and Maryland (Jon Hoppe): 48

Florida (Keith Lipscomb): 32

Illinois (Mary Schulz): 37

Pennsylvania: (Christopher Fiore): 30

Copyright troll M. Keith Lipscomb and his network of local attorneys filed 170 cases on behalf of Malibu Media in 2014 so far:

It is funny that in Lipscomb’s own backyard, Southern District of Florida, the scythe ran into a stone, and his attempt to obtain identifying information of an alleged infringer has failed: Judge Federico Moreno was apparently irritated when he denied Lipscomb’s ex-parte motion to leave to serve third party subpoenas prior to the Rule 26(f) conference (Malibu Media v. John Doe, FLSD 14-cv-20216).

Calling out Lipscomb for his lame lawyering (failure to cite any binding case law in support of early discovery), the judge concluded that

Plaintiff has not provided this Court with “good cause” to deviate from Rule 26(d).

Moreover (and heartwarming), Judge Moreno makes it clear that he is aware of Lipscomb’s industrial-scale litigation¹, and the judge cited Judge Wright’s famous order:

“The federal courts are not cogs in a plaintiff’s copyright-enforcement business model.” Malibu Media, LLC v. John Does 1-10, 2012 W L 5382304 at *4 (C.D.Cal. June 27, 2012). Plaintiff has filed what amounts to a boilerplate brief to support its motion. The arguments made in this brief do not persuade the Court to deviate from the normal application of Rule 26. Therefore, Plaintiffs Motion for Leave to Serve a Third Party Subpoena Prior to a Rule 26(f) Conference (D.E. No. 4), filed on January 27, 2014 is DENIED.

I’m not sure if Lipscomb will be able to file these half-assed cases in FLSD anymore after such a bold hint to get lost. From the district’s chief judge, no less. However… Mr. Lipscomb’s hubris and greed may prompt him to stubbornly continue his shakedown practice. Well, succumbing to those “virtues” played well for John Steele. Go ahead, Keith, dig deeper.

Related

Torrent Defender blog: New filings from Malibu and a (small) ray of sunshine from the Sunshine State by Charles Thomas.

Updates

1/24/2014

This order was noted by a Doe Defender Paul Overhauser in Malibu Media v. John Doe (INSD 13-cv-01525 — I recently covered this case) as an additional authority for the Motion to Quash Subpoena.

On 4/4/2014, following Judge Ungaro’s order that caused significant resonance in the media, Judge Moreno sua sponte issued an Order to Show Cause “why the Court should rely on geolocation services to establish the Defendant’s identity and location in this district, as well as why the Southern District of Florida is an appropriate venue for this case.” Response is due on April 14th.

¹ I love this phrase, which was introduced by Morgan Pietz.