Happy May Day everyone! Want to know what’s going on in the Billy Mitchell versus Twin Galaxies court case? Of course you do! These things have a tendency to move at a snail’s pace, but we actually have some recent developments to cover, including a big, fat, stinking L that just dropped on Billy’s attorneys. Let’s get to it!
LAST TIME ON LAW AND ORDER: M.A.M.E.
In October and November of 2020 (a year and a half ago now), I did three updates on Billy’s defamation lawsuit against TG, and on TG’s counter-suit against Billy Mitchell and Walter Day for fraud:
https://donkeykongforum.net/index.php?topic=2795.0
Let’s start by getting caught up on two significant rulings which were covered in the first of those links. One of those rulings went in favor of TG, the other went in favor of Billy.
The most talked about ruling was on TG’s anti-SLAPP motion. Many states have laws that allow for the early dismissal of frivolous lawsuits whose only goal is to stifle protected speech (widely referred to as “Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation”). The idea is that the plaintiff (in this case, Billy) has to show that he’s at least claiming to actually have all the elements he will eventually need to have a case. In court-speak, this is called a “prima facie” case. Competing evidence from the defendant isn’t weighed at this early stage of the proceeding, because that’s the purpose of the eventual trial – to lay out all the evidence and have the finder of fact (usually a jury) decide whose evidence and arguments are stronger. The defendant can argue that the plaintiff hasn’t actually assembled a minimal case, but disputes over facts won’t get hashed out at this point.
The problem is, this system breaks down when the plaintiff is willing to just straight up lie through their teeth, as Billy has shown himself more than willing to do. I’m not going to sidetrack into Billy’s specific lies today, as it would be quite a lengthy detour. Read the latter few sections of the newly updated “Evidence against Billy Mitchell” post for more on that:
https://perfectpacman.com/evidence/
At any rate, as I discussed in the October 2020 update, Billy took a victory lap on social media, relying on people not knowing what “prima facie” means:
If you didn’t know latin, and you read that last sentence, you might think Billy had just won his case outright, or had established some sort of strong chance of prevailing, rather than that the case is simply being allowed to advance to trial. Again, the court wasn’t even allowed to consider competing evidence, some of which straightforwardly shows Billy’s claims to be false (such as the easily debunked claim that Billy never assisted Carlos Pineiro with his testing). They just looked at what Billy claimed, brought up a checklist of things he’ll have to establish if he wants to win the case, and said “Yep, if all you say is true, and if the defendant doesn’t put forth any defense, you could possibly prevail.”
Truthfully, I hesitate to even call Billy’s win on the anti-SLAPP motion a “victory”, since it just means his many, many lies are going to be scrutinized in court, and those witnesses who signed those statements written up by Junior are going to be brought in, put under oath, and asked some tough questions. In other words, I don’t think the “victory” of moving his case forward to trial is actually going to work out so well for Mr. Mullet. In the long run, he might have been better off if his case had been tossed early on some technicality. Indeed, he may yet find a way to scuttle everything before it gets much farther, so he can go around claiming he would’ve won while avoiding the actual humiliation of putting his dogshit case through a trial. But since a trial ostensibly appears to be what Billy is currently aiming for, I guess I do have to chalk this anti-SLAPP ruling up as a win for Billy, for now.
The other big ruling from October 2020 was on TG’s “undertaking” motion. No, Jace Hall isn’t slamming Billy through a table, at least not yet. In plain English, Twin Galaxies requested that Billy be required to put up an $81,225 bond in order to continue with the lawsuit. Think of it as basically a deposit. Since Billy is an out-of-state litigant, and since he could be found liable to pay TG’s court costs and attorney fees and such, this deposit is to ensure Billy doesn’t just skip town on the bill.
It’s typical in these situations for a lawyer to ask for the moon and stars (as we’ll see later in this update, lol), and then they can be more-or-less content when the court meets them halfway. So in that light, it probably meant something that the court didn’t just meet TG’s request halfway; the requested amount was granted in full.
Notice how, unlike in anti-SLAPP, the court was able to take TG’s evidence into consideration when ruling on the undertaking. They’re still not making a full ruling on a complete dissection of all the evidence – again, that’s what the trial is for. But suddenly, at least when taken at face value, TG’s case looks a lot more favorable. It’s also hard not to read into the fact that the amount requested was granted in full. I can’t speak from expertise on this matter, but I have been told that such a move is very unusual.
Billy’s lawyer did try to argue that the undertaking should be put off until TG’s anti-SLAPP appeal had run its course (which ended up taking about a year), but he got denied. The money did eventually get paid, putting Billy about $80,000 deep into this, just one of his ongoing legal cases. (Billy had to put up a similar deposit to file his lawsuit against Karl Jobst in Australia, but I’m not sure if the amount in that case has been made public.)
JUDGES VERSUS GAMERS
As mentioned, Twin Galaxies did appeal the anti-SLAPP ruling, which resulted in a delay of about one year, as the matter wound its way through appellate courts. Eventually, in October 2021, it found its way to California’s Second Appellate District Court of Appeal. While Billy’s case is buoyed by a number of outright lies, even in the context of the aforementioned anti-SLAPP restrictions, there was a legal argument that could be made that Billy would not be able to show at least a prima facie case that TG acted with actual malice, which under defamation law would be necessary since Billy is a limited public figure. In other words, hypothetically speaking, even if you accept Billy’s claim that he provided the names of all these witnesses to Jace to interview, and even if we take Billy’s word that Jace thumbed his nose and ignored all of them, and even if the claims Jace made ultimately turned out to be false (which, they weren’t false, but again, hypothetically), a case could be made that even that simply does not qualify as “actual malice” as the court would define it, which is one element Billy would have to prove. Along the same lines, none of the witnesses Billy cites in his legal threats and declarations can speak to why his submitted tapes could not have been produced by an original unmodified DK machine. They simply testify that there was a real DK machine near Billy at some point, and that he played a game of Donkey Kong on it. What this means is, TG still had justification for their actions and their statement even if you accept Billy’s provided testimony as true, which the court does during anti-SLAPP.
However, the appellate court chose to affirm the lower court’s ruling, on the same basis that Billy had made at least a prima facie showing of his case, and that they can’t consider TG’s evidence to the contrary:
You can read the full appellate ruling here. Throughout the document, you can see the judges cite and rely on claims from Billy and from Walter Day in support of Billy, which for purposes of anti-SLAPP must simply be taken at face value. The court reiterated, in a footnote, that there are many factual disputes, which have to be resolved at trial:
The ruling concludes by announcing that “Mitchell is awarded his costs on appeal”. We’ll unpack that a bit later. At any rate, it is official: The case will go to trial. (At least, as long as Billy doesn’t chicken out first.) Billy did his usual thing from his Twitter pillow fort, but this time, his law firm – Manning, Kass, Ellrod, Ramirez & Trester – took a victory lap along with him:
https://www.manningllp.com/news/Manning_and_Kass_Scores_Big_Win_in_AntiSLAPP_Case/
https://twitter.com/ManningKass/status/1458868509807550464
For their sake, I hope they’re still riding that anti-SLAPP high, because as you’ll see in a moment, things haven’t gotten much better for them.
Before I get to that though, there was a bit of disturbing language in the appeals court ruling I don’t think should be ignored. On page 16, the court discussed TG’s assertion that Billy is attributing to TG things TG did not actually say in its stated dispute conclusion. Indeed, TG simply found that the tapes which were historically used to authenticate Billy’s scores could not have originated from an unmodified Donkey Kong machine as was claimed. However, on pages 16 and 17, the judges sided with Billy, in regards to the interpreted breadth of TG’s dispute conclusion:
I’m going to get on a soapbox for a bit about this language, so feel free to skip ahead to the next section if you wish. But I believe this is something the competitive gaming community should really take notice of. Basically, these judges’ argument is “You removed all of Billy’s scores, which was equivalent to publicly calling him a cheater, even if you didn’t say it.” But the obvious problem is, a competitive leaderboard has to be able to remove a sketchy player’s runs without it being defamation. Requiring otherwise leads to some very immediate problems, when one thinks through the subsequent series of events. (Note that I’m not calling these judges stupid. They are possibly inconsiderate of the broader consequences of such a ruling, but really, they are just looking to apply the laws as they were written, which generally do not take things like competitive gaming adjudication into play.)
Circumstances such as those seen in Billy’s case cast immediate doubt on other score claims from the same player. Thus, it’s perfectly reasonable for a scoreboard to simply de-list a player. While there are many conclusions one could draw from such an act, one reasonable conclusion can be that the scoreboard is simply disassociating from the player for undeclared reasons. This reasonable precaution may not necessarily involve conclusive proof, which could require extra effort needed to eliminate outlandish possibilities like prototype cartridges and cosmic rays. In other words, a scoreboard should be able to take the position of “We’re not saying that all these scores/times are false, but we will no longer be the certifying authority authenticating them as true.” (Note that while recent evidence has cast serious doubt as to the veracity of Billy’s claimed Pac-Man score in 1999, that historical claim was more generally accepted as true when Twin Galaxies ruled on the Donkey Kong score dispute in 2018. It was simply de-listed when TG de-listed all scores by the offending player.) Imagine if any sort of business partnership could not be severed without a public statement from both sides giving a clear and frank reason for the severance, which would thus open them up to defamation lawsuits. Certain basic human interactions would begin to break down in this litigation-happy hellscape. There’s also no argument to be made that failing to list a score is tantamount to declaring it objectively false. No scoreboard, even one which declares “world records”, claims to be all-encompassing. There are always going to be amazing scores which are never submitted or even discovered. Each scoreboard also has submission rules which must be followed, with violation of such rules often resulting in lack of recognition whether or not the score is generally believed to be “real”. Note also that Twin Galaxies is a private scoreboard. As a matter of law, they should be allowed to disassociate from any player for basically any reason they want, other than membership in a legally protected class such as race or religion. (As far as I know, “massive douche” is not a protected class in California.) It’s also not hard to see what would happen to a scoreboard if they were unable to ban players for submitting bogus scores/times/evidence. You would end up with a situation where a contested player could simply keep submitting runs, exhausting moderation staff in the process, secure in the knowledge that some of them will stand on the leaderboard simply for the fact that they could not be outright proven false. While I’m not trying to cast aspersions on anyone simply for disagreeing with me, I find it difficult to imagine anyone who isn’t a cheater welcoming such an environment.
These implications raise yet another issue, regarding the community’s own attention span for this case. During the 2018 score dispute, the speedrun community at large took an interest in the Billy dispute, likely due to it coming off the heels of the Todd Rogers drama and featuring some of the same characters. Updates to the speedrun subreddit were regular, and were often greeted with upvotes and high engagement:
https://old.reddit.com/r/speedrun/comments/7utqfv/twin_galaxies_first_todd_rogers_is_out_now_billy/
https://old.reddit.com/r/speedrun/comments/7vefn1/donkey_kong_scoreboard_strips_billy_mitchells/
https://old.reddit.com/r/speedrun/comments/7y5nmb/apollo_legend_on_donkey_kong/
https://old.reddit.com/r/speedrun/comments/7zqkft/twin_galaxies_billy_mitchell_the_case_against_an/
https://old.reddit.com/r/speedrun/comments/7zrjbv/official_dispute_of_billy_mitchells_donkey_kong/
https://old.reddit.com/r/speedrun/comments/83znwe/computer_engineer_sheds_new_light_and_information/
https://old.reddit.com/r/speedrun/comments/84c5zv/team_billy_mitchell_falls_on_their_faces_again/
https://old.reddit.com/r/speedrun/comments/8566gc/the_case_against_billy_mitchell_dispute_summary/
https://old.reddit.com/r/speedrun/comments/86fa4a/twin_galaxies_when_this_post_is_half_an_hour_old/
https://old.reddit.com/r/speedrun/comments/8b75hx/twin_galaxies_paralegal_friend_of_billy_mitchell/
https://old.reddit.com/r/speedrun/comments/8bp1q8/twin_galaxies_bans_billy_mitchell_and_removes_his/
https://old.reddit.com/r/speedrun/comments/8c14rm/guinness_book_of_world_records_officially_removes/
https://old.reddit.com/r/speedrun/comments/8c8vnq/billy_mitchell_has_a_new_sponsorship_deal/
https://old.reddit.com/r/speedrun/comments/8chw42/billy_mitchells_official_statement_on_his/
However, over time that interest waned. Indeed, this was never a “speedrun” case, but a high score situation. There’s some obvious overlap, but for their own reasons, the two communities have largely operated independently of each other. Within the speedrun community, hostility to the continued coverage of the Billy story grew over time. The train of thought seemed to be “I’m sick of hearing about Billy, therefore if we stop talking about him, he’ll go away.” As I mentioned in my previous update, even forum moderation began to express disinterest in allowing discussion of this story to continue on speedrun-dedicated forums.
However, all of this is predicated on the notion that the Billy versus Twin Galaxies legal case bears no relevance to the speedrun community, when in fact, that alarming bit of language from the California appeals court applies equally to high score gaming and speedrunning. I’m not a lawyer, and so I’m not going to speculate on how applicable that specific ruling is toward any future cases involving video game cheaters attempting to sue adjudicators for de-listing their scores. But I know that, one day, this will all happen again. Some other narcissist with resources will decide their lies are more important than the scorekeeper’s integrity. It could be Twin Galaxies again, or Donkey Kong Forum, or Speedrun.com, but some gaming leaderboard is going to have to choose between recognizing a proven cheater’s runs or fighting it out in court. And cases like these give us a window into how these judges without gaming backgrounds are likely to rule.
Continuing with my soapboxing, at the risk of sounding expressly frustrated, I’ve been genuinely surprised by the resistance I’ve encountered to continued coverage of this story. I’ve stopped even attempting to post updates to the speedrun subreddit when my work kept getting denied a fair chance to simply rise or fall on its own merits under the Reddit voting system. Believe me, no one, and I mean no one, wants this story to end more than the people embroiled in it and the people covering it. However, like it or not, this case simply has to be covered to completion, both for the possible legal ramifications toward gaming adjudication, and for the fact that a failure to shine a light on the bully’s actions only enables the bully and isolates him with his victims. Simply dismissing this case as some other community’s concern is myopic. To me, it sounds every bit as uninformed as when people say “It’s not a speedrun if you use glitches”. (If anything, the actual dispute in 2018 could have been dismissed as a “high score” story, while the later lawsuit is the story that should be transcending community divisions, so it’s strange to me that it has largely panned out the opposite way.)
To be clear, I’m not saying most in the speedrun community do dismiss this legal case as such. Indeed, the lawsuit has generated a dearth of timely coverage compared to the day-to-day accounts coming from the public dispute thread in 2018, and much of the tepid reaction to current developments can be attributed to that. However, this doesn’t explain suppression of what few updates are provided, nor does it justify those gamers who do dismiss this situation. If you appreciate any realm of competitive video gaming, whether as a participant or merely as a spectator, your eyes should definitely be on this case. It doesn’t even matter if you appreciate Twin Galaxies itself or not. It is simply imperative that TG prevail in their defense against Billy Mitchell’s retaliatory lawsuit, no matter what it takes.
Okay, I’ll get off my soapbox now, and get back to funnier matters, as we bid an apparent farewell to an old friend.
NO MORE GREASY
Remember this guy?
James Edwin Gibbons, better known in the post-dispute thread as “Mr. Greasy”, or occasionally, “Jimmy Gibberish”. Attorney of record for Mr. William Mitchell.
Yeah, he’s gone. What happened? I don’t know. All I know is this. He was working for Billy’s California law firm of Manning, Kass, Ellrod, Ramirez & Trester:
Apparently he was a partner at the firm! But that page is dead now. And instead, Greasy Gibbons is off working… here?
https://www.londonfischer.com/attorneys/james-gibbons
It’s definitely the same guy, with the same credentials. He doesn’t seem to be a partner anymore, though:
He went from partner at one firm all the way down to “Of counsel” somewhere else. And no, surprising as it is that we’d have an archive capture of London Fischer attorneys whose names start with “G”, we do have exactly such an archive from about a year ago, and ol’ Greasy Gibbons wasn’t associated with London Fischer then:
So yes, technically, it would be incorrect to say Billy’s lawyer bailed on his case specifically. Instead, he bailed on his ENTIRE LAW FIRM LOLOLOLOLOLOL. Gosh, I wonder if getting them all entangled in this massive turd of a Donkey Kong case had anything to do with his sort-of-retirement. Strange though, if they’re so confident in the case, why wouldn’t he have stuck around to the end for that big windfall?
Billy’s now being represented by an amalgamation of founding partner Anthony Ellrod and someone named Natalya, which makes me think of that stupid control room mission in N64 Goldeneye.
As they are now on the record representing Billy Mitchell and his never-ending lies, making them fair game for our mockery, I looked for new derisive nicknames to replace ol’ Greasy. I tried out some variation of “Tony Takes the L-rod.” I could also stick with the Goldeneye theme and just call him “Boris”.
But really, as we’re about to see, this could just be the beginning of the lawyer carousel for Mr. Mullet. So instead, I’ll be referring to them all by a group nickname: The U2 Fan Club.
Confused? Good. We’ll get to what that means in a moment. But before that, we have yet another new attorney entering this ongoing clusterfuck from yet another direction.
YOU GOT SERVED
While Billy Mitchell’s defamation suit against Twin Galaxies has gotten most of the attention, TG’s cross-complaint, also known as the counter-suit, is still very much active. As discussed when it was first filed, the claim is for damages of over six million dollars for things such as fraud related to TG’s sale, breach of contract, intentional interference with TG’s relationship with Guinness, civil RICO violations, and a bunch of other unsettling stuff. Most notably, in addition to everybody’s favorite Video Game Fraud of the Century, the counter-suit adds a new cross-defendant: Twin Galaxies founder Walter Day. But since Walter wasn’t a direct party to this initial lawsuit, he had to be served.
https://thewalterdaycollection.com/articles/events/453-walter-day-at-pinball-expo-2021
Luckily for Jace Hall and Twin Galaxies, Mr. Day loves those public appearances. Announced as far back as April 2021, Walter was slated for an appearance at that October’s Pinball Expo in Schaumburg, Illinois.
You can probably guess what happened next:
Hey, they gave him two and a half days to enjoy the expo first.
No photos or videos of this service were provided as part of the legal filings available on the Los Angeles court website. At any rate, Walter Day is now officially a party to the proceedings, necessitating an official response to the counter-claim. More importantly, since his interests and Billy’s don’t necessarily align, he had to secure the representation of his own attorneys, by the names of Mariko Taenaka and Robert W. Cohen. (The name Cohen immediately makes me think of that Leonard Cohen song that was in King of Kong.)
For what it’s worth, Ms. Taenaka and Mr. Everybody Knows (both California-based attorneys) don’t seem to be affiliated with the Maharishi School in Fairfield, Iowa, like Walter’s old attorney friend (and Roy Shildt antagonist) Burton Milward was. In other words, it’s unlikely Mr. Day is getting the “old friends” discount. And remember, in the United States, for better or worse, even if you win your case, you’re not necessarily entitled to recover attorney fees unless the court finds that the case brought against you was especially frivolous. And thus, the clock has started on Day’s billed hours.
As a quick aside, we’re about to get into some actual court filings. Note that these legal filings are public records, and are available to anyone on the Los Angeles court website, however the court charges a small fee to cover the cost of the download service. Normally, I’d just be offering synopses, with a few imgur-hosted screenshots of the juicy parts, as I’d been doing before. But now, I have a snazzy new website, which means I can just upload court filings and give them to you all for free! I have an eye on possibly doing this with every filing going back to the beginning of this case, however some of them contain personal info (phone numbers and addresses and such). And since I don’t want to give Billy such an easy opportunity to argue that I “dOxXeD” him (even if by merely by posting publicly available court filings from his own lawsuit which he chose to engage in), I will likely look into alternate provision of those documents. At any rate, this matter doesn’t deal with any sensitive info, and as such, I can provide ten of these filings today.
Returning to our story, Taenaka and Cohen have already submitted two filings in Walter Day’s defense. One is just a procedural declaration from Cohen, exhibiting some corporate paperwork from Twin Galaxies. But the other, more important one, is a motion to quash the cross-complaint, alleging that California is an inappropriate jurisdiction for this cross-complaint against Mr. Day:
So yes, Walter Day believes he can’t be sued in California for fraud relating to the sale of a corporation to… Jace Hall, a resident of California. Also, for a guy who claims to not have “minimum contacts” with the state of California, he sure does love traveling there for public appearances a lot (though maybe less frequently now that the pinball museum in Banning has become a pot farm). There’s a hearing scheduled to address this motion on May 26. We’ll see how well that works for him.
Interestingly, since being served with a lawsuit at a public event, Walter seems to have become a bit of a recluse. His appearance at Free Play Florida less than a month later was by conference call. And in February, at the Walter Day National High School Esports Award Ceremony (the one featuring Billy Mitchell standing on a toolbox), Day once again appeared via Zoom:
At least at the later event, the host explained Walter’s remote appearance by saying he was “under the weather”. Obviously, I don’t wish to make fun of Mr. Day’s situation if he genuinely is in poor health, which apparently spanned a few months. But for a man who had no qualms about making any and all public appearances he could during the height of the pandemic, one might be forgiven if the timing of his seemingly permanent move into a secret bunker feels more than coincidental.
THE ATTORNEYS OF RECORD
Getting back to the main course, one must wonder what keeps Billy’s attorneys in this fight. Think about it. At first blush, this is a standard contingency case. “Instead of being paid normally for our time, we’ll take the case up for ‘free’, then win a bunch of money when the other party settles, then we’ll take a big cut of that settlement as our fee.” And on the other end of the arrangement, you know Billy’s cheap, so he wouldn’t want to pay the lawyers up front either. He’d also likely be deferring the question of money until they could divvy up a settlement.
But… there’s been no settlement…
… which means… no money…
I’m guessing Natalya and Boris (and Greasy, for that matter) don’t appreciate working for free. So… what exactly is going on here?
This is a bit speculative, but I think it’s fair to ask the question. While I can’t say for certain, Billy’s September 2019 legal threat has all the markings of something that was never meant to be seen by the general public. Remember the upside-down page? Or the proofreading marks right in the document? Remember the signed statement which, they assured Carlos, nobody would ever see? Rookie bullshit. Surely, the hope was to simply scare both defendants – Twin Galaxies and Guinness – into settling out of court without the need to actually file a lawsuit, and without any of the gritty details ever being made public. This theory is borne out by the fact that Guinness did exactly that, restoring Billy’s scores without ever publishing the legal threat they received or citing any specific pieces of evidence to justify their decision. (Craig Glenday made vague allusions to witnesses or hardware verification, but didn’t illustrate exactly what pieces of evidence were convincing, or in what way.) Additionally, at least as I understand it, it’s common for corporations like this to have insurance to cover such litigation, and for firms like Ellrod’s to prey on that tendency for quick settlements. But Twin Galaxies it seems either doesn’t have litigation insurance, or is choosing for their own reasons to fight the lawsuit in court.
The point is, Mr. Greasy almost certainly started working this case on contingency. The question is whether Tony and Nat are still working on contingency. If Billy’s paying them for his time, that has major implications, as he can’t keep paying these pricey lawyers these big bucks for a lawsuit that’s going to go nowhere, while also having to put up massive deposits ($80k in the TG case) on two different continents. Billy has money, but he doesn’t have that much money. Also, if there was a switch at some point, I wonder how that conversation went. “Heyyyy, sooooo, we were gonna represent you for free and just take a slice of the winnings, but since it looks like there never are gonna be winnings, that offer’s done now, and you gotta pay us.”
But I’m going to make an educated guess and say, I don’t think any of that is the case, at least not yet. Given what we’re about to see in a moment, I think Billy’s lawyers are still in contingency mode. And that, my friends, is a whole ‘nother can of worms. Obviously they never took a hard look at the evidence, or else they probably never would have taken this case in the first place. They probably took their client, semi-famous movie guy, at his word. I mean, geez, he’s got all these witnesses? And technicians who’ll testify his game board was legitimate? And he says people filmed them setting up the machines at these venues? And Jace Hall is a meany mean head who refused to listen to reason? I’m sure, listening to Billy lie through his teeth, this sounded like the greatest case ever. And the lawyers sure didn’t do a lot of work on that legal threat Billy Junior put together.
I think they’re still working for free (on contingency). In fact, I’m so sure of it, that I’m now calling them the U2 Fan Club, because they are working “Pro Bono”.
(I know, I know, two different pronunciations of “Bono”. But hey, this is print.)
But there’s another issue here, which makes this more complicated. That’s right, the counter-suit! That wasn’t a thing when the U2 Fan Club first took on the case. Until recently, U2FC had only stuck to representing Billy in his theoretically profitable defamation lawsuit against TG. But it was an open question as to whether Billy would (or could) retain the same counsel for the cross-complaint as he has for the defamation suit. However, that question was resolved in late March when Natalya filed “William Mitchell’s answer to Twin Galaxies, LLC’s cross-complaint”:
The filing lists no fewer than 28 alleged “affirmative defenses”, including that the counter-claim violates “the doctrine of waiver”, “the doctrine of ratification”, and “the doctrine of unclean hands”. Note that one of these alleged “affirmative defenses” relates to the statute of limitations. Indeed, with TG’s sale occurring in 2014, the case would be well outside the normal statute of limitations. However, this window is extended in cases where the injury isn’t discovered until later, or when the case involves “fraudulent concealment”, which just so happens to have been current Twin Galaxies’ third cause of action in their counter-suit.
In addition to their attempts to get the counter-claim tossed altogether, the U2 Fan Club also assert the right to more time to complete their own investigation into the facts.
I guess you could say they still haven’t found what they’re looking for.
At any rate, what’s important about this filing is that the U2FC are now on the record as Billy’s counsel in the cross-complaint. That doesn’t mean they can’t bail out on this, or the main lawsuit. It just means A) if they are indeed working for free, they’re in it really deep now, and B) if they do bail on Billy, it will be very obvious if and when they do.
THE MAIN EVENT
Okay, there’s one more matter to go over today, but it’s a doozy, and once again, it has to do with money. Remember earlier how I said the appeals court ruled that Billy would be “awarded his costs” when TG appealed the anti-SLAPP ruling?
Recall that, in the United States, “court costs” do not include attorney fees. So, for their choice to appeal the anti-SLAPP ruling which was ultimately upheld, TG had to pay the logistical costs of Billy’s attorneys – basically, just the costs of filing their briefs and such to the court, which amounted to just under $600.
So even with that win over the anti-SLAPP motion, if the case is still on contingency, the U2 Fan Club still ain’t getting paid!
This leads us to a recent battle between U2FC and TG’s lawyer, David Tashroudian, better known as the Mighty Mister Tash. On February 8, Tony (who is definitely about to take an “L”)rod filed a motion to recover not only the court costs but attorney’s fees as well:
Since I’m making the actual documents available, I’ll be skipping over some of the banter and legal arguments, which you can read in full for yourself. But what is basically being alleged is that TG’s appeal of the anti-SLAPP ruling was frivolous, and that Mr. Tash knew it was frivolous when he filed it. Ellrod (the apparent author of the motion) included a lot of colorful language listing all the hard work he and his poor, starving colleagues had to undertake, all because mean old Twin Galaxies appealed something that (according to him) couldn’t possibly have been decided any other way.
I can see why Billy likes these attorneys. I definitely get some “birds of a feather” vibes reading through some of this:
Along similar lines, Ellrod later takes an unnecessary personal shot at Jace Hall (“defendant”), likely going off what Billy tells him:
Ah yes, I’m sure this lawsuit has been a major financial windfall for Jace and TG, who only get dragged through the mud over yet more bogus scores on their leaderboard.
Skipping back a bit, Ellrod even goes so far as to argue that TG’s timing in moving for the undertaking was a bad faith attempt to lock up Billy’s deposit money for longer than was necessary:
Honestly though, reading that, that does sound a little scary. Could the Mighty Mister Tash have made a tactical error? Could this be the argument that compels the court to effectively sanction TG and Tash by forcing them to pay U2FC’s attorney fees?
The filing makes further legal arguments stating that, if the court finds that frivolous actions were taken strictly to delay, then attorney fees must be awarded. Even more alarming, Ellrod argues for why the court should hold Mr. Tash individually liable for some portion of those fees:
So yes, they were going after Tash’s wallet specifically to fund their case.
So what exactly is the amount of money the U2 Fan Club is requesting as compensation for their time? For that we turn to Tony Ellrod’s sworn declaration, filed on the same day:
This declaration by Ellrod starts with the claim that his firm collectively spent over 356 billable hours, just on the anti-SLAPP matter:
Note that these claims weren’t itemized beyond that. Ellrod simply testified as to how many hours each individual spent, on a variety of listed tasks.
So how much exactly was the U2 Fan Club asking for? How much did Mr. L estimate this anti-SLAPP appeal cost him and his associates?
Yes, that’s right. They asked for damn near a quarter of a million dollars.
Again, as I said earlier, sometimes lawyers will ask for the moon and stars, hoping to at least bring in a portion of what they ask. And there’s no rule against asking for outrageous sums of money at junctures like this. But the absurdity of this request, I think, speaks to the question of whether Billy’s lawyers are being paid. Notice also how the request is couched as “This is what our time is hypothetically worth” and not “This is what our client actually paid us through this appeal”.
They have to realize by now that a settlement isn’t happening. But surely, if their eyes are on a trial award, they could proceed confident in the contingency on which they entered this case in the first place. In the context of this case, and how the lawyers surely entered it, and the way in which everyone who understands the evidence knows this is going to go, this reeks of desperation. This is a hail Mary attempt to see some kind, any kind, of return on their investment.
Ellrod’s filing continues by listing all the things they allegedly did with this time they spent. He also tacked a 50% multiplier onto his own and Steven Renicks’ time to add another $20k, because sure, why not? The filing then rounds out with lengthy descriptions of the credentials of each member of Team U2.
Finally, tying it all together, the motion for fees makes it clear, once again, that (in their opinion) the court should find Tash himself liable for a significant amount of this quarter of a million dollars:
Let’s just say, the Mighty Mister Tash was having none of this.
On March 22, Tash entered his own filing in opposition to the Bono Bunch’s request for fees. Basically, Tash argued that Billy’s lawyers did not meet their burden of proof, given that the tactics TG used were allowed by law and/or condoned by the court. Tash then argued that the case involves important issues around free speech regarding public figures, meaning that TG’s “zealous advocacy” of those rights should not be considered frivolous.
Tash also argued that Ellrod’s attempt to claim fees without submitting a single time record violates TG’s due process rights:
Furthermore, while Ellord can issue a declaration testifying to his own work, Tash points out that he relies on hearsay statements to justify the numbers attributed to his colleagues:
Here comes the true Chad move. Tash then argued that Team U2’s motion for fees “is so poorly conceived, and ill supported that it is frivolous.” And as such, Tash argues that it’s actually he and TG who should be entitled to an attorney fee award of $13,000, just for having to deal with their bullshit:
And you know, you know, Mr. Tash accompanied this motion with a full declaration, clearly accounting for his time and outlining his justification for the $13k award he’s requesting:
Additionally, just for good measure, Tash filed an additional objection to a few items of hearsay “evidence” put forth in Ellrod’s declaration:
Ol’ Boris fired back on March 28, with a reply to the evidence objection, briefly arguing that he is a “proper custodian”. Thus, I suppose, that whole “due process” thing goes out the window because he says so:
Ellrod also responded with a reply in support of their original motion for attorney fees:
Amusingly, this filing included this bit of language undercutting Mr. Mullet’s own attempts to boast of his anti-SLAPP victory:
Hmmm, I guess that big anti-SLAPP win wasn’t such a big deal after all.
Ellrod then argued that they don’t need to make any further effort to show that TG’s anti-SLAPP motion was in bad faith because, as Ellrod portrays it, the actions themselves were so blatantly vexatious:
Ellrod also argued that case law has already been established saying that they were not required to itemize the billable hours being claimed:
If court outcomes were easy to predict, there would be many fewer lawsuits and motions. Sometimes, judges and juries work in mysterious ways. As you can see, with this battle over a quarter of a million dollars in attorney fees, both sides write very confidently (as they should), and both appear on the face of it to have justifications for their positions. No matter how strong your case, no matter how much you prepare, no matter how solid your evidence and your arguments, there comes a point in every court case where you have to hold your breath and hope for the best.
The hearing, initially scheduled for April 5, was put off for two weeks. Finally, both parties would get their answer on the morning of Tuesday, April 19.
DEEEEEE
FUCKING
NIED!!!!!!!!
Now, you might say “Wait, TG asked for money, and they also got denied.” Sure, but they only asked for $13k. Billy’s lawyer asked for TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS… AND GOT NONE OF IT. Yeah, it would have been epically hilarious for the judge to say “Tash gets his $13k, and Ellrod gets squadoosh,” but it’s a rare day when you get everything you want.
Also important to remember is that Tash, as the defense attorney, is getting paid. While there may eventually be a reward from the counter-suit, that wasn’t part of the original case when he came on board, which means he was never in a position to work on any sort of contingency. It was proper for him to file for recovery of costs on this motion, but his service doesn’t live or die on whether he could bring that money in. His work carries on.
Meanwhile, over at the Joshua Tree, the mood could be anywhere from “Aw shucks, we didn’t win this one, we’ll get ’em next time,” to full on pants-flailing, dumpster-blazing panic. We just don’t know. But certainly, somewhere in the back of their minds, they have to be considering the possibility that they’re never gonna see a single solitary dime from any of this.
Oh and let’s not forget, we no longer have to guess what the Bono Bunch thinks their time is worth. They itemized it all themselves. Again, it seems really unlikely that Billy’s paying these guys, but even if he is, if we take them at their own word, he’s out a quarter of a million dollars to those greasy fucks. But more likely, Billy’s paid them nothing but sweet words, handshakes, and firm eye contact. Which means, per their own valuation of their time and energy, they’re over $200k in a sunk cost hole that’s only going to get deeper. SSSSSSSUCKERRRRRSSSSSS!!!!!!
So yeah, Tony’s and Natalya’s volunteer legal service rolls on. I hope their lunch room is stocked up on discount ramen and generic cocoa puffs. But I guess that’s what happens when you hitch your wagon to the guy who thinks his fake MAME tapes are even better than the real thing.
IT’S A BEAUTIFUL DAY
So what’s next for Mr. Mitchell and his favorite pop rock enthusiasts?
The trial date has been set for March 24 of next year. (Wait, are they really starting a trial on a Friday?) However, don’t write that in stone just yet, as there’s still much to happen before then, and it would not be a surprise for that date to keep getting pushed out until both sides have completed their preparations.
One thing to still be taken care of is discovery. Yes, Twin Galaxies will have the right to see private communications between Billy and his cohorts, like Walter, Todd, and his tech Rob Childs. I’m guessing that’ll be interesting. Also, the process requires depositions for willing (and some not-so-willing) participants. If you thought this update had some sizzle and steak, just wait until we get actual new Billy testimony to laugh at and dissect. Want to hear Walter Day get questioned under oath by Mr. Tash? Want to know what Rob Childs has to say about the 1.047m? What about those mortgage broker friends of theirs? Or Literally Todd Rogers? Oh, and the cross-complaint depositions will be carried out as well. I’d be interested to hear Craig Glenday from Guinness say under oath “Yeah, we didn’t really examine Billy’s claims, we just gave him his scores back so he wouldn’t sue us.” And while Billy may at some point undergo a rather sudden disinterest in continuing this legal train wreck he boarded, nothing at this point is going to stop the cross-complaint examination. No matter what Billy does now, shouting “mayday mayday” isn’t going to be enough to save him.
Stay tuned!
What a gigantic shit show. Crime doesn’t pay afterall!
“So why do you think Mitchell is truthful?” “He’s really, really nice. He knows how to strike the right chords with me.”
There’s more to a person than that, but I get it. He has a way with words. Also, I believe he’s now lost 300k over this lawsuit if we’re counting the undertaking. I can only imagine how much more debt he’ll have once this is all done and over with. Shall we keep track?
“Jim! I think you’re having an affair with that lawyer at work!”
“Wait a moment Mrs Gibbons my sweet wife, remember how we watched that show ‘King of Kong’ and there was that dickhead with the bad hair? I’ve spent the last month at work trying to show that – if everyone believes his lies – his lawsuit has at least a slim chance of being successful.”
SOBS. “I would rather you were having an affair!”
“OK love, I’ll tell the truth. I’m about to quit the firm so I’ve been doing fuck all. That walking caricature won’t be able to pay us anyway. And I’m fucking a Polish actress on the side.”
“Oh Jim, just as long as you don’t cheat when we’re playing Mario Kart.”
lol
Thanks for the update mate. This is like watching a car crash.
Absolutely an amazing job updating the community on this train wreck of a trial.
I did a little more research into the lawyers from their site. Although Ellrod does have some prior experience in defamation, Vasyuk is part of the “Business Litigation, Intellectual Property, Corporate and Commercial Transactions, and Sports, Recreation and Attractions Law teams”.
Also, I can’t even get on their site to see the records. I get a bad login when I try to continue as a guest, and clicking on the create account doesn’t work at all for me. Is their site broken?
I should probably clarify why I bring up specializations. It’s not illegal to take on a case you don’t primarily handle, but if you are part of a large law firm with tens, if not 100 lawyers to cover all areas of law, wouldn’t it make sense that the lawyers who usually handle such take on the case? That was the case with Gibbons, after all.
Just a quick update, the trial has been pushed back to Friday, June 30, 2023, probably because the discovery/deposition process is taking so long. You can always find the latest on this case at the LA court site, searching for case # 19STCV12592 under Stanley Mosk Courthouse:
https://www.lacourt.org/casesummary/ui/index.aspx?casetype=civil
I check the lacourt case and as i see last update is this :
05/08/2023 Notice (of withdrawal)
Filed by William James Mitchell (Plaintiff)
or not maybe i simply misunderstand the U.S law terms
Thank you! Good catch. Even though it’s titled funny, he’s not withdrawing the whole case (which would be complicated, since he’s being counter-sued now and can’t just nope out of that). He’s withdrawing two upcoming hearings he had scheduled for May 18 (today) and August 17. Sounds like he was going to try to compel TG to provide more material in the discovery/interrogatory process, but has since changed his mind. (Maybe discovery’s been going very poorly for him, lol.)
https://perfectpacman.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/Legal-2023-05-08.png
Ahaha thanks for explanation, would be awkward if he did, I hope this not delaying the trial further i wish to see the end of this pretty soon
ahh excellent, I was wondering what the site was for those resources.
Looks like the case has been pushed to November 17, 2023 – a little over a month from now, for me :P.
Funny I ended up reading about this story just as the trial is set to continue. Not that I’m that invested in it, more mildly curious