Porn trolling has never been a glamorous business. But as judges, bar associations, and others have gotten wind of just how sleazy the porn-trolling business model is, trolling law firms have faced more and more obstacles. One trolling firm hit a new low on Tuesday, when an exasperated federal judge in Tampa, FL, threw out its copyright infringement case.

In a surreal court session, Judge Mary Scriven grilled several individuals with ties to Prenda Law, a law firm that specializes in copyright trolling, and its alleged client, a porn company called Sunlust Pictures. (We say "alleged" because Prenda now claims, unconvincingly, that it was never involved in the case.) It quickly became obvious that no one in the courtroom had any significant ties to the supposed plaintiffs, or even knowledge of who they were. So Judge Scriven dismissed the case for, among other things, "attempted fraud on the Court" for sending a "representative" to court who knew next to nothing about the company he was representing.

State of confusion

In an exposé published earlier this year, the blog Fight Copyright Trolls details how Illinois attorney John Steele opened a branch of his law practice in Miami despite not being licensed to practice law in Florida. A Florida attorney who specializes in representing defendants in troll cases, Graham Syfert, thought Steele's operation seemed fishy and asked the Florida Bar to investigate. The bar got Steele to sign an affidavit promising not to practice law in Florida.

Fast forward to this Tuesday's hearing in Judge Scriven's courtroom. A porn company called Sunlust Pictures is suing a defendant, Tuan Nguyen. Sunlust was represented by a local Florida attorney named Jonathan Torres, who told Judge Scriven that he was appearing on behalf of Prenda Law, a law firm with ties to Steele. Syfert, the attorney who had reported Steele to the Florida Bar, was representing the defendant and had filed a brief arguing that the plaintiffs had concealed key information from the court. So the judge began to ask questions about who exactly was representing Sunlust.

"I'm a little confused," she said. "There was a lawyer who moved to withdraw, and there was another lawyer who moved to appear, then he moved to withdraw." She then asked: "Who is on first, I guess?"

Scriven had good reason to be confused. Torres, speaking to the court by phone, said he had been brought into the case recently as a Florida counsel by Prenda Law. But Judge Scriven said, "I got a letter from someone from the Prenda Law Group saying they were not representing any party in this case and were not involved in the case and had no authority to speak on anyone's behalf in this case."

In any event, Torres told the judge he wanted to be excused from the case because he was recently "contacted by defense counsel and was advised of certain issues that were going on in the case."

Torres was brought into the case after the previous Florida counsel, Matthew Wasinger, himself decided to bow out of the case earlier in the month. Indeed, as Fight Copyright Trolls documents, the position of Florida counsel for Prenda has been something of a revolving door. Prior to Torres and Wasinger, two other Florida attorneys have asked to withdraw from the case since August. Fight Copyright Trolls speculates that as soon as attorneys realize the "stink" associated with Prenda Law cases, they bow out to avoid putting their reputations at risk.

"Not involved in this case"

So who is "Sunlust Pictures, LLC?" A man named Mark Lutz was in the courtroom as the company's representative. But it turned out that he was a "representative" in only the loosest sense of the term. Under questioning from Judge Scriven, Lutz admitted that he wasn't an attorney, wasn't an officer of Sunlust, was not "authorized to bind the company to any legal contracts," and couldn't even name any of Sunlust's officers. Indeed Lutz admitted he was not a salaried employee of Sunlust at all. He was an independent contractor whose only role with Sunlust was to show up in court on their behalf.

Judge Scriven then spotted another man near the plaintiff's table and asked who he was. "Your Honor, my name is John Steele," he said. "I'm an attorney, but not involved in this case," he said. Indeed, he stressed that "I want to make very clear to this Court I'm not purporting in any way to be an attorney licensed in the State of Florida."

Syfert, the defense attorney, then helpfully pointed out that Lutz used to work for Steele. "Mr. Lutz was actually a paralegal and debt collector for Prenda Law when it was a multi-state, multi-jurisdictional law firm between here and Illinois," Syfert told Judge Scriven. The judge grilled Steele about his knowledge of Sunlust, but Steele also pled ignorance about who owns and operates Sunlust Pictures.

The exasperated judge told Lutz the court would not consider him a representative of Sunlust. "You're not a corporate representative of anybody if you don't have any information about the corporation," she said. Given that neither Lutz, Steele, or Torres were able to speak on behalf of Sunlust, that meant that there was no one available to speak on behalf of the plaintiff.

It also meant that for this copyright trolling, it was game over.

"The case is dismissed for failure to appear at this hearing, for failure to present a lawful agent, for attempted fraud on the Court by offering up a person who has no authority to act on behalf of the corporation as its corporate representative, and the Court will hear, by motion, a motion for sanctions and fees against this Sunlust entity and everyone affiliated with it, including a motion against Mr. Wasinger for his purposeful failure to appear at this hearing," Judge Scriven said, according to the official transcript.

She also said that Paul Duffy, the man who currently runs Prenda Law, may face sanctions for his "lack of candor" in claiming not to be involved in the case, when Torres had testified that Prenda had asked him to join it. Judge Scriven plans to "advise the other judges in the courthouse of the nature of this matter and may refer this matter to the Florida Bar for further proceedings."