A Virginia lawyer used intimidation and bullying tactics, including spurious trademark infringement and defamation claims, to shut down a Web site that criticized him, Public Citizen argues in lawsuit filed against the lawyer and his firm.
The complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, seeks an order that would prevent John Dozier of Dozier Internet Law from pursuing defamation and trademark claims against Ronald Riley, who runs the Web site CyberTrialLawyer-Sucks.com. The suit also asks for attorneys fees, court costs and $1,000 in punitive damages.
In the past month, three successive Internet hosting companies have taken down Rileys Web site after each company received a warning letter from Dozier. Among Doziers complaints was that Riley used his firms name to link to an unrelated Web site, which Dozier claimed was a trademark infringement.
In at least two cases, companies were told that if they didnt take down CyberTrialLawyer-Sucks.com, they would run the risk of having the Web sites of all their clients shut down.
Last month, Dozier sued Riley and several related companies in Virginia Circuit Court, alleging statutory trademark infringement and common law trademark infringement. However, Dozier has never served that lawsuit on Riley or the other defendants, Public Citizen said.
Doziers claims are baseless and intended to squelch Rileys right to free speech, said Public Citizen attorney Paul Alan Levy, who is representing Riley, along with local counsel Thomas Wolf of the Richmond firm of LeClair Ryan.
The courts repeatedly have struck down these types of bullying tactics and upheld the publics right to criticize people and companies on the Internet something which Mr. Dozier was well aware of when he began his intimidation campaign against our client, Levy said. Not liking what someone says about you is not enough reason to throw out the First Amendment.
Levy argued that Dozier has no right under the trademark laws to force Riley to hyperlink the names Dozier and Dozier Internet Law to Doziers own Web site, and, in any event, his use of the terms was fair use and protected, non-commercial speech.
Although Rileys site admittedly drips contempt for Dozier Internet Law, the statements are not defamatory because most of them are opinions, and any statements of fact on the site are not false, Public Citizen argued.
The suit asks the court to declare Rileys Web site lawful and not in violation of Doziers legal rights.
