2nd Circuit Upholds Non-Monetary Sanctions Against Copyright Troll Richard Liebowitz
upstart writes:
2nd Circuit Upholds Non-Monetary Sanctions Against Copyright Troll Richard Liebowitz:
Here's a quick update on infamous copyright troll Richard Liebowitz. As you may recall, after tons of stories about Liebowitz's horrendously bad activities in and out of court, federal district court Judge Jesse Furman finally threw the book at Liebowitz in an incredible ruling that literally catalogued dozens upon dozens of examples of Liebowitz lying to his and other courts. Furman issued both monetary and non-monetary sanctions. Among the non-monetary sanctions was a requirement that Liebowitz file a copy of this particular benchslap in basically every court where he is representing a client.
Liebowitz whined about how unfair it all was, and appealed the ruling. On Friday, the 2nd Circuit Court of appeals upheld the non-monetary sanctions, saying it will release its opinion on the monetary sanctions shortly. The ruling is pretty short (unlike Furman's explanation of all of Liebowitz's wrongdoing), but the general conclusion is: all the evidence says that Furman was exactly right, so his sanctions order was fine.
There's also a fun footnote dismissing one of Liebowitz's classically silly arguments:
Appellants' argument that the sanction would impose a substantial burden because deposit filesare expensive to obtain is unpersuasive. As the district court noted, Liebowitz often settles casesin the low thousands or tens of thousands of dollars' . . . a far cry from the $200 to $1,200 cost ofobtaining a deposit copy."
Liebowitz made some other arguments as well, but the Court notes: "We have considered Appellants' remaining arguments and find them to be without merit."
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