Multiple federal judges in Chicago have absolutely ripped the tactics of the state's only attorney filing mass P2P file-sharing lawsuits in recent weeks. Now, two new rulings directly contradict a ruling from Judge Beryl Howell, an RIAA lobbyist-turned-federal-judge in Washington, DC, who said that mass subpoenas against alleged file-swappers were proper.

Last week, Judge Blanche Manning of the Northern District of Illinois "severed" two of the P2P suits filed by local attorney John Steele, cutting them down from 1,800 combined defendants to just two. The judge, acting sua sponte (of her own accord, without ruling on a motion), told Steele that he must file a separate lawsuit against every anonymous target of his litigation, not try to combine hundreds of people into a single case.

Manning said that the defendants were "improperly joined" because the defendants weren't engaged in the same "transaction" or "occurrence." She also noted that each one would have a different factual defense, and that Manning could "be faced with dozens if not hundreds of factually unique motions to dismiss, quash, or sever from potential defendants located all over the country with no discernible ties to this district."

She also poured extremely cold water on Steele's entire business model, which to date relies mostly on out-of-state pornographers. Manning noted that the two plaintiffs, Millenium [sic] TGA Inc and CP Productions were based in Hawaii and Arizona, respectively, and most of the defendants are outside Illinois, too. (Indeed, the judge seems particularly annoyed to keep receiving amateur motions to quash from all over the US, noting that she received five of these last week alone.)

Manning also noted that Steele could have used basic geolocation tools to identify likely Illinois defendants before bringing such cases. But when neither the plaintiff nor most defendants are in Illinois, the judge can see "no facts indicating why venue is appropriate in the Northern District of Illinois."

As a result, Manning cut both cases down to a single defendant and ordered Steele to notifying all defendants of her ruling. He must also "cease and desist all efforts to identify the users of the relevant IP addresses" of those who have been severed from the case.

Not going well

Separately, a different judge tossed Steele's case on behalf of MCGIP (video: Gloryhole: Dayna Vendetta) back on March 10. The reason? Steele had only filed a copyright registration form on behalf of the film—necessary for litigation—but the film had not actually been registered yet with the Copyright Office. Case dismissed. (After Steele complained, the judge rescinded his order but told Steele he "is ordered to show cause within 14 days why the case should not be dismissed for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted." That hearing has been delayed until later this month.)

Three weeks ago, another Chicago-based federal judge, Milton Shadur, all but called Steele an unethical lawyer as he dismissed yet another of his cases. “I accepted you at your word,” said the judge, pointing to Steele's assertion that the case was connected to Illinois. But, after allowing Steel to take discovery and issue subpoenas to Internet providers, "I start getting motions to quash” from places like Tennessee, Texas, New Jersey, from "people that had nothing at all to do with the state of Illinois.”

“I don't see any justification at all for this action,” the judge concluded, and he had less-than-complimentary things to say about Steele's work. Facts in the case “were not as asserted,” said Shadur, adding that case filings “did not really comply with the subjective and objective good faith requirement."

Steele appears to be a "colorful" character. A former family law attorney, he jumped into P2P litigation last year and almost immediately ended up in litigation with a rival P2P law firm over trademarks. He travels around to porn producer conferences, hoping to drum up business; at a recent event, an eyewitness tells Ars that Steele was on a panel and stepped onto stage with a beer in his hand. When asked about the various recent legal rulings on issues like personal jurisdiction, Steele allegedly responded that they were "mumbo jumbo, chicken gumbo."

Still, despite his setbacks, things could be worse; judges in Texas and West Virginia have severed or dismissed entire sets of cases at once. Steele's have been chopped down to size one or two at a time.

"His cases were doomed"

Even other attorneys who bring such mass file-sharing cases are irritated by Steele's tactics—he's making them look bad. Lawyer Marc Randazza, no stranger to representing porn studios in similar cases, told Ars, "I do not find anything wrong with going after individual torrenters. I do this on behalf of my clients, and I make no apologies for it. However, when you do these cases, you should do them as cleanly as possible—not try to game the system. It seems that the judges feel the same way."

Randazza continued:

At that meeting with him, I warned him that his cases were doomed—that the jurisdictional issues would haunt him, and I also said that if any clients wanted to enter the world of torrent litigation, they probably should use someone who has a history of dealing with copyright issues—not a divorce lawyer who just filed his first case, apparently plagiarized from another firm [as Ars reported]. Steele's reaction was arrogant, to say the least, and he seemed to believe that my comments were based on a concern that he might provide competition for me. That made me laugh. The laugh became even more hearty when I saw how every thing I told him he would suffer came to pass this week.

The law firm Booth Sweet, which has represented numerous file-sharing defendants (including several in the recently dismissed cases), praised last week's rulings, but noted that subpoenas had initially been granted and settlement offers had likely been made.

"While Judge Manning has added to the growing pile of flawed cases tossed by the courts, the plaintiffs (and their lawyers) have raked in untold thousands in settlements from defendants who choose to settle the claims to avoid expensive litigation in a faraway federal court," they wrote last week. "One lesson from Judge Manning’s decision for plaintiffs (and their lawyers) could be: breaking the rules won’t help you make your case. And for people who get threatening letters from plaintiff’s attorneys or notices of impending lawsuits from their ISPs, there’s another lesson: Don’t be intimidated. You can win if you fight back."