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Is Prenda calling it quits or cooking a new fraud?

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During the seasonal festivities, we missed an elephant in the room. In December 2012 notorious copyright troll Prenda Law started dismissing its individual cases by large numbers.

Table of individual Prenda cases

In the Forbes’ article, John Steele bragged that “he files 20 lawsuits a month, and would like to increase this to 300.”

Those of us, who know this miserable individual, did not believe a single word. Moreover, I speculated that the blizzard of individual lawsuits was the last grand bluff, last attempt to extort ransom payments before abandoning the sinking ship. Steele also bizarrely stated that individual lawsuits brought more money to him than the mass ones. Any rational person understands that this is an absolute hogwash. While filing all these cases is feasible (though costly), maintaining them is way beyond Prenda’s capacity, even if Prenda manages to triple the number of underemployed scumbag lawyers — like Jacques Nazaire from Georgia, or Jonathan Tappan from Michigan. As I had predicted, in most cases defendants were not even served:

Sure Steele and his goons still can make an effort and heave a couple of summons, but what about all of the currently named cases that rot in dockets all over the country? What will they do with this load? What is going to happen when it comes to depositions?

Prenda can’t even organize the complaints on its site, listing unrelated Duffy’s cases together with extortion lawsuits. In another occasion, an individually named defendant has not been dismissed from the underlying mass lawsuit. And this is just the tip of the iceberg: these guys absolutely, positively cannot manage the load they announced.

Copyright Clerk was close: he noted that Prenda dismissed 34 lawsuits filed on behalf of Sunlust Pictures, all during December. Yet we thought that it was caused by the courtroom fiasco, and Sunlust’s principals tried to mitigate the effects of unwanted publicity. Or maybe because DieTrollDie uncovered and reported a fraud committed by a Virginia troll Timothy Anderson in connection with Sunlust lawsuits. So, Sunlust dismissals were at least explainable.

Then one of the most controversial lawsuits, Hard Drive Productions v Does 1-1,495, was inexplicably killed. Then some commenters started mentioning dismissals, taking place here and there without apparent reason. Finally, it became clear that something big is going on.

Prenda did not file new federal lawsuits since November (except for one occasion when a cheerful idiot Sam Trenchi initiated a couple of AF Holdings cases, as if another Alan Cooper was magically found).

I compiled a table of Prenda’s individual cases — both those, in which defendants were named, and those with John Doe as a defendant. I started with the list found on Prenda’s website, but there are more to be added.

I randomly checked different lawsuits, and it seems like Prenda indeed has been killing nearly all of its cases filed on behalf of the following plaintiffs:

  • Sunlust Pictures
  • Openmind Solutions
  • Millenium TGA
  • Boy Racer
  • First Time Videos
  • CP Productions

(A couple of cases is still alive because the entry of defaults.)

Interestingly, the following “plaintiffs” were spared, and their cases are still active:

  • AF Holdings
  • Ingenuity 13
  • Quad International

AF Holdings and Ingenuity 13 are offshore (and possibly even outright fake) corporations that are in the center of “Coopergate” — allegation that Steele and his gang forged the signature of their purported CEO Alan Cooper, using identity of a man (real Alan Cooper) against his will or even knowledge.

I know almost nothing about Quad International, but definitely, it makes sense to investigate this “corporation”: the majority of undertakings by Steele and Hansmeier are tainted with fraud, so there is a viable chance to unearth another scandal.

I cannot read crooked minds, and undeniably, we don’t have enough information to speculate about both why all these sudden dismissals are taking place, and why the most suspicious “plaintiffs” were spared at this time. I hope that Prenda’s impudent fraudulent activities have finally caught attention of law enforcement, and the crooks are on the run. I will be happy to find out readers’ opinions.

I did not want to spend all my weekend checking every lawsuit, and I hope for help with filling out this table.

Two questions of the day
  • Is it wise to settle with Prenda today?
  • Was it ever?

Filed under: Prenda

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