Judge shuts down opinion website.

nuac wrote: »

If these solicitors were originally acting for the businessman or for the company concerned there was obviously a conflict of interest and a breach of duty of care.

I don't know what their relationship with him was. I know they knew enough about his business.

If so the Law Society would take a robust view. Likely to demand full restitution or else a strike off,

No. Because unfortunately, he had done something wrong. His warehouse burned down, it was covered by insurance - but whatever way he'd gone about things he was insolvent and lost the business.

Even if the businessman or the company was not their client it is possibloe that there woujld be misconduct finding with like consequences.

When you say it was all "perfectly legal" did you have another soliicitor investigate the matter?

I think he went through a bit of a battle to get the use of his name back. I think he left the country in the end.

My father did eventually get paid - though they had tried to claim the money owed to my father was personal debt of the businessman.

benway wrote: »

Did the company go into receivership or liquidation or something like that?

Something like that. I'd have to talk to someone I have spoken to in a long time to get more of the details.

I really think that a lot of these problems come down to honest misunderstandings of what the law is and how it works.

Being bambozzled or out manoeuvred, is not down to honest misunderstandings.

Personally, I would be very wary about getting into a business with a solicitor or legal professional. I'm not saying solicitors are crooks - I have had a run in with a few, where I got the impression they had a distorted sense of right and wrong - that what was technically legal was okay. When that isn't really the case. I don't have a grudge against the legal profession. I have come across solicitors engaging in dishonest and misleading business - but not breaking the law. This wasn't a misunderstanding - it actually took me months to understand what they were doing - or not doing.

If you have a business. There is trickery that can be used to take the business from you. One common tactic - and I've seen this done - is to cut the business's cash flow, and force the owner to hand over most of the company. Or virtually all of it.

Eduardo Saverin, the co-founder of Facebook. Facebook's lawyers pulled a fast one on him, getting him to sign away nearly all of his share of Facebook, while he was under the impression they were representing him.

People have been bamboozled out of their businesses. If lawyer says and believes that it's all fine, once it's legal - they are crying out to be strangled.

Ignorance of the law is no excuse, for a lawyer to facilitate the screwing over of the ignorant.

People have all kinds of preconceptions about how the law works, or should work, based on cultural understandings from the print media, literature, TV, film, word of mouth, etc. Problem is that often times these aren't accurate in the slightest. I'm firmly of the view that basic law should be a compulsory subject on the Junior Cert. Mind you, the VPLS are never shy to take an honest misunderstanding and weave it into their conspiracy theory.

A little law in the junior cert would not be enough. The law is largely opaque to those who are not legal professionals.

And even for legal professionals - I've heard stories of legal professionals or people trained in the law being caught out themselves.

I can see how people could be very angry with their solicitors. I knew a man, who was going through a messy divorce. His wife's legal team offered to accept a settlement of half a million. He wanted to go for that, but his legal team convinced him that it would be better to go to court and they told him they could get the amount down - it was a very messy break up, and he was really in no state to be making sound decisions. In court, 2.5 million was awarded to his wife - which was more or less the shirt off his back. It was very poor representation. Literally risking the entire farm for a few acres. You could see how people might get very angry.

CatherineMac wrote: »

krd: Can I first of all just say that I am not here to defend solicitors. As with any profession there are the good and the not so good and the downright awful. I am only here to let people see how easily they can be torn apart on the internet if they become the object of someone’s bad obsession.

I think in your case, what you've really been a victim of is cyber stalking, and bullying. And it's not really about defamation.

A problem with the internet, is just makes this behaviour so much easier than it was in the past. There are people who really enjoy bullying. Defamation and personal attacks are just a means to bully.

I'd be wary about holding hosts responsible for the behaviour of people who use their forums - in the same way, I don't think phone companies have an absolute responsibility when it comes to be people who might use telephones to harass people - which people do, and did before the internet.

Defamation and harassment are two very separate issues.

Surely that applies to anyone not just a solicitor? My point (which you were responding to) was that the site would have been okay were a person to say, for instance, “In my opinion, I was overcharged. I had x done and was charged x amount.” The reader could then decide themselves whether they considered that solicitor too expensive for them. The poster (not being able to hide under a proxy IP) would then be able to stand behind their words, and back them up were they called to task. And the key there is “In my opinion” by the way. It is not a statement of fact, rather it is the posters opinion.
“

No. This is a common misunderstanding as regards defamation. Stating that something is just your opinion, is not an ass coverer. I'm not a lawyer - but I have read guides for journalists on what can get them in hot water. There is no qualifier you can use, when you make a statement that is potentially defamatory if it was stated as a bare fact, that will protect you from being sued. Even if you indirectly imply something that may be defamatory, then you're exposed to a legal action.

Defamation laws can only be used to silence lies.

Defamation laws are used to silence and bully people all the time. For example, Simon Singh was unsuccessfully sued by the British Chiropractors Association. The case took up more than a year of his life - he had to spend 250,000 of his own money to defend himself. Had he not had that money, he could have been wiped out and definitely silenced.

Another famous case is the McLibel case. A group of environmental campaigners handing out leaflets criticising McDonalds felt the full crushing weight of McDonalds legal resources bearing down on them. Most of the campaigners capitulated. Two of the campaigners stood their ground - and the case rumbled on for 20 years.

The tactic is called
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_public_participation

You can’t sue someone who says something like “I think he is a horrible”. That is your opinion.

You can’t however say “I think he is horrible and he would rob you blind if he gets a chance.”

You can sue, if someone says "I think he is horrible" - you probably won't win. But that may not be what you're after. If you have a lot of money - and the other person doesn't - you can get them to capitulate.

You can sue on the basis of an implied slight. You can sue on absolutely spurious grounds. And people do.

If you have the cash, Carter Ruck will help you shut anyone's mouth for them.

The “bad guys” can’t take a successful action against you if you are speaking the truth AND can back it all up.

I can sit in a room with a bad guy, with him twiddling his moustache and telling me in intricate detail, how he planned and executed his swindle. Unless I nearly have a written confession from him, I can't state publicly he's a swindler. And I can tell you for a fact, Dublin is full of bad guys twiddling their moustaches and having a good laugh at fools they've made of everyone.

A bent solicitor can also coach a moustachioed swindler into how to cover their tracks and put themselves where they can neither be accused or found guilty of fraud and swindling.

Even if you know the truth, and have spoken the truth - if you do not have the resources to defend yourself the person suing you will be successful. If a rich person decides to sue me for defaming them, my solicitor, since I'm am person of meagre resources, will advise me to capitulate and beg for mercy. My only other option is to grandstand and go down in flames - probably even end up in jail.

(MY POST: They also posted under made up names (in our case) of people who supposedly were disgruntled former clients. Not one, not even one of these names existed on our database of clients NOR on the voters roll of Donegal.)

Yes. I would say the people making personal attacks, were simply cyber stalkers, who didn't know you from Adam, and just saw you as the perfect victim, to have their fun with. RYS shouldn't have allowed itself to be a platform that kind of behaviour.

If someone forced the shutdown of a site which was properly monitored to ensure spurious drivel was deleted, then the person shutting it down would hardly shine a great light on themselves.

Some forums can be quite large, and it's very difficult for the moderators to keep and eye on everything. They are watchdogs, not bloodhounds - as auditors like to say when egregious fraud happens right under their noses.

In the first instance, they could not shut the site simply because they didn’t like what was on it (providing of course it was not breaking the law).

No. If a host is threatened with legal action - they have to make a decision, whether to capitulate or expend resources defending themselves. I believe Michel de Montaigne once said that he would rather flee the kingdom than face trial, if accused of stealing the towers of Notre Dame. You'd need to be rich or very principled to go up against a wealthy bully, in the instance they are using the threat of law to break you.

Someone can only go as far as taking successful action if you have lied. They cannot do it on a whim, so we are not comparable with China in that regard.

Yes, they can take an action against you on a whim.

We know that some of the press is biased but, as with the failure in the end of the “super injunctions” surely they can print whatever they decide appropriate if it is true?

Of course the press is biased. Everyone is biased. The papers have to make a judgement call as regards to what they print - they also have to carry hefty libel insurance. The more they're sued - the higher their premium - and they don't always get costs if they win. Trivial mistakes in reporting can often cost them dearly.

The ease of obtaining proxy IPs and the misuse of them, is allowing nameless people to say whatever pops into their nasty minds and to post those thoughts with impunity. And that is wrong. I have never in my 20 odd years on the internet used a proxy IP and really don’t see the need for them. That said, someone pointed out to me that some people use them as they are protecting their identity ~ not so they can descend into malicious activities, but rather that they just don’t want their name/location out there.

Even if proxy IPs were banned - and some forums do block them - it would not resolve the issue.

I won't give a complete technical explanation - the more savvy someone is, the more they can circumvent whatever obstacles are put in their way.

For example. Wikipedia, track edits by IP address - I'm not sure if they allow proxies - but they will block an IP if they find the person at the end of it is using it for malicious purposes. Savvy Wikipedia vandals get around this simply by cloning other peoples IP addresses. And that is just one way of doing it. And this method is very common.

“Catherine, if I was determined and malicious enough, I could post comments on forums, where if they traced the source it would come back to you.”

You have me intreguied. You will need to explain further as I have never heard of this before.

For some people, it would be as easy as writing a letter, pretending to be you and just popping it in the letter box.

“You're always going to have to take what gets published on the internet with a pinch of salt. And nearly everyone does.”

I absolutely refuse to do that. I am not going to lie down and let unknown people gang up and bully me and then attack my family too under the protection of proxy IPs. And no-one else should have to put up with it either. The people who do such things need to be stopped. They are causing a lot of harm to others and in certain cases, causing the subject of their abuse to end or try to end their lives because they just can’t deal with it anymore. That cannot be right nor acceptable.

It isn't right, and it isn't acceptable. I'm just not really sure what can be done. I don't think it should be approached in terms of defamation.

I don't know......You couldn't just shut down the postal service, because some individuals were using it to send poison pen letters.

I don't know what could be done. I don't think there is a simple solution.

That is why I want laws brought in to make it easier for people to stop nastiness against them on the internet in a quicker, smoother, and less expensive fashion.

And in relation to the internet stalking and abuse problem, I was on twitter when the Channel 4 show on it was on last night and tweeted about my being the subject of it myself and asked if anyone else had experienced it. I was snowed under with the responses (mostly from women). Most only had one stalker and the experience lasted on average anything from a year to 18 months. So there is a very definite need for stricter laws in realtion to this every increasing problem.

Yes, I've witnessed cyber stalking.

And I'll tell you something interesting. Someone I've seen who was stalked - a woman - this is on a forum I use a lot and have followed for a long time, so I could see the complete evolution of the stalking. One of the stalkers tactics was to claim the woman had made defamatory remarks about them, that they were the wounded party - do you see what these pricks can be like. They confused and muddied the waters.

A trick that some trolls like to do - and I've seen it done on boards - is to try and wind up another commentator, until they get angry enough and say something that gets them banned from the forum.

So, can you see the problem. If it became too easy, and inexpensive to stop the nastiness - the nasty people would very likely use that system to get at their targets.

I have family members who are absolutely poisonous people. I avoid them like the plague. I know, even though I have nothing to do with them and avoid all contact - they still, for some reason I can't fathom, spread malicious and damaging untruths about me. What can I do. I don't have the money to shut them up - I can't catch them red handed, though I know they have their whispering campaign.

benway wrote: »

Not going to go much further than that, save to say that there are remedies available for those claiming bamboozlement by solicitor ... and to observe that your story that began as a solicitor usurping someone's company now seems to have turned into a bog-standard liquidation, a routine way of winding down an insolvent company.

No. the whole point is it was not a bog-standard liquidation. The company was profitable, and in reality solvent - there was just an issue over an insurance claim. The company was not wound down - continued to trade. And the insurance issue was resolved. Leger demain.