Malibu Media Ordered To Pay Wrongfully Accused 'Pirate' Even More Money After Failing To Abide By Court's Decision
from the keep-digging dept
Regular readers here need only hear the name Malibu Media to get their eyes rolling. This copyright troll that emerged from pornography producer X-Art has made quite a name for itself by attempting to shake down hundreds of accused copyright infringers, often using all kinds of shady tactics. Expert witnesses that nobody is quite sure even exist, failing to serve defendants, attempts to quickly dismiss cases against those who are willing to fight back: it all paints the picture of a shady operation looking to use shady tactics in order to collect shady infringement settlements. All, mind you, in the name of law and order in the realm of copyright law.
Except, as with most shady operations predicated on the law like this, the hypocrisy from Malibu Media is quite stunning. For example, Malibu Media accused defendant “W.M.” of infringement in court, only to have the defendant file a counterclaim demanding any actual evidence the company had of their infringement. No evidence was produced, leading the court to decide in favor of “W.M.” and to issue an order for Malibu Media to pay him/her nearly $50,000. In the least surprising news ever, Malibu Media didn’t pay that amount as ordered.
In most cases an order like this would end things but, in this instance, things went from bad to worse. Malibu Media failed to pay up and on top of that, the company actively diverted funds that should have been used to pay these fees.
To recoup the money, Mr. W.M. hired Joseph Stewart, an experienced collection attorney. They went as far as obtaining a order that required Malibu Media and its payment processor Epoch.com to restrain the subscription revenue from “X-Art.com” members.
You would think that would have been the end of it. But, no, Malibu Media continued its bad actions, this time trying to play a shell game with where its revenue was coming into and going out. Colette Pelissier, top executive at Malibu, failed to show up for court hearings without an excuse. As a result, Judge Thomas Durkin signed an order that would see Pelissier arrested if she failed to show up to the next hearing. While that forced her to show up, it was fairly clear she wasn’t prepared for that hearing.
We haven’t witnessed the hearing ourselves but copyright attorney and YouTuber Leonard J. French, who is not involved in this case, told us that the proceeding was quite messy.
Pelissier reportedly had a complete breakdown. She spoke quickly and panicky, while repeatedly interrupting the Judge, referencing issues that appeared to bear no relation to the case at hand.
The court was decidedly displeased with this performance.
“I deal with prisoners who are more appropriate, I have people who are mentally ill who can conduct themselves with more decency,” Judge Durkin said, before cutting off the call.
The result? Well, Judge Durkin basically doubled the amount of money Malibu Media owes “W.M.”, increasing it to just over $100,000. Now, such a six-figure sum is certainly warranted for a wrongfully accused defendant such as “W.M.”, but it remains to be seen if anyone can manage to actually collect this money. The payment processor has reportedly collected about half that much as restrained revenue from Malibu Media, leaving roughly half to go.
As with all of these stories, you would think this really should be the bottom of the hole that Malibu has dug for itself, but the shady copyright troll always seems to want to keep digging.
Filed Under: attorney's fees, colette pelissier, copyright, copyright trolls, default
Companies: malibu media, x-art
Comments on “Malibu Media Ordered To Pay Wrongfully Accused 'Pirate' Even More Money After Failing To Abide By Court's Decision”
Just desserts
Looks like Malibu Media are the ones getting fucked now.
Re: Just desserts
They will probably record it and put it up on piratebay and then sue anyone downloading it.
Re: Re: Just desserts
Another, eeew, why would anyone pay to watch this.
Re: Re: Re: Just desserts
"Another, eeew, why would anyone pay to watch this."
I assume none which is why that recording is likely to stick around on the bay being seeded only by the people who have developed real grudges with Malibu over the years.
Still, this has become a trend, hasn’t it? ACS: Law, Prenda, now Malibu…almost as if copyright troll outfits were run by grifters so inept and avaricious they are unable to run a business at length without trainwrecking it spectacularly in the most stupid manner possible.
Re: Re: Re:2 When the system rewards sleaze you get lots of it
I mean yeah they’re corrupt and incompetent but at the same time I can see how and why they’d get so sloppy and arrogant.
Given how long outfits like theirs are able to run rampant abusing the legal system for personal gain with basically zero consequence until the end it’s not too hard to see why they’d come to believe that it’s a zero-risk ‘business’ with no real skill needed beyond being a colossal asshole willing and eager to monetize the suffering of others required, and for the most part they’re correct in thinking so.
Re: Re: Re:3 When the system rewards sleaze you get lots of it
"…it’s not too hard to see why they’d come to believe that it’s a zero-risk ‘business’ with no real skill needed beyond being a colossal asshole…"
Well, it’s more or less the same way an entitled asshole child grows up to become an entitled asshole adult suddenly shocked at the way the world turns out not to provide the same free pass on deplorable behavior which mommy and daddy did.
The parallell does point to a rather interesting similarity in the way copyright law favors and forgives the most deplorable of shitwits but other laws don’t – which must come as a shock if you’ve spent a great many years operating under a legal paradigm where the burden of proof is reversed and baseless accusations in front of a court is void of any penalties.
Re: Re: Re:2 Just desserts
"being seeded only by the people who have developed real grudges with Malibu over the years"
Guardaly?
Re: Re: Re:3 Just desserts
And a few senior citizens pushing 90+ who were falsely charged by M.M. If nothing else having to defend yourself from torrenting will certainly teach you how it’s done.
Re: Re: Re: Just desserts
rule 34.
that is all.
Sucks to be on the other side of that doesn't it MM?
Oh how tragic, the top exec of a company who’s entire business model is centered around making the lives of people miserable by abusing the court system wasn’t having fun when they were presented with the options of ‘show up in court voluntarily or show up in court in cuffs’, what terrible news.
Whether the victim actually gets the full amount owed to them might be in the air but I can’t imagine behavior like this would look good to other judges, which probably won’t help MM in future extortion attempts.
Re: Sucks to be on the other side of that doesn't it MM?
<insert Monte Python-esque crowd murmurs of "mhm, terrible. Horrible. Utterly deplorable. Why in my time…etc>
christmass came early!
I logged in @ 21:50 to my work computer to check & see if I had any exciting work emails & this is what I found under my techdirt tree!
& they say miracles don’t really happen any more…
Leonard French has put out a couple of videos on the lead-up to the increased judgment, and the details are pretty juicy. Apparently Colette claimed that as a result of the lawsuits they filed, her enterprises are running out of money, she and her husband can’t afford lawyers to help with the cases, and their marriage is apparently on the rocks. (Which… isn’t earning her a lot of sympathy.)
Leonard’s last video on Malibu Media was dated November 10th, though I think the recent comments from Durkin from a more recent hearing. FCT has posted a quote: "Judge Durkin to @colettexart during today’s hearing in #MalibuMedia v Mullins: "You don’t sue people lightly. When you sue and things go wrong, there are consequences."" Personally I can’t wait for Leonard to put out a video on the Nov 30 hearing where Durkin got pissed off per the above quote.
out_of_the_blue, John Smith… this is what happens to your glorious heroes of copyright. Enjoy the bed you took a shit on.
Re: Re:
"she and her husband can’t afford lawyers to help with the cases"
Like much of everything she says, I don’t believe it.
I think they ran out of lawyers willing to do business with them.
Something something the lawsuits going both ways between MM and Lippy over getting paid lots of settlement cash everyone calims they don’t have.
She has also claimed that their website is constantly being hacked & their videos stolen having spend millions to secure it… yet somehow video not even posted on the website yet were bundled up with many other MM titles and on the torrent sites.
Funny that.
Of course MM also created the massive multifile archive model to terrorize people into paying them the low low price because when you multiply the insane damages x number of films in the bundle the astronomical number makes people panic & give up.
So sad she wasn’t in cuffs, but there always is hope…
I mean they finally manage to notice Prenda, can MM be that far behind?
Re: Re: Re:
I fully agree with TAC on you have to take what Colette says with a grain of salt.
Remember Collette was whining and crying in interviews and and court documents for years on end about how their businesses like X-art were on the verge of collapse because of piracy and they were so close to the edge of collapse and financial ruin and they have " no choice" but to file some 8800+ to protect their copyright and property, yet they continued to thrive some how opening up Collette;s vanity porn site Collettedotcom, they were paying for some models living arrangements who were signed with them( wait I thought they were in the throws of despair and just about on the street ) and lets not forget they bought that 8 million dollar Malibu mansion they were shooting porn in ( in contravention of Malibu city residential bylaws ) I cant imagine what a struggle it must have been for old Collette and Brigham to have to pack up and move to an 8 million dollar Malibu mansion, I mean the hardships they must have faced doing that, I am sure other in the porn industry working in their apartments and 3 bedroom houses in suburban neighbourhoods, and those working in rented office space were all sitting around at the Adult industry convention wondering if they should start some kind of a telethon or maybe put donate pages up on their adult websites to help get cash together to help poor struggling Collette and Brigham get by, because I cant imagine the sacrifice it takes to live in an 8 million dollar Malibu mansion ( I dont normally throw around the word Heroes but…. )
It always mazes me that Malibu Media in their lawsuits will ask you to turn over everything electronic that you own practically and cant wait to snoop into ever detail of your life 9 and browsing history etc and expect you to turn everything over straight away but yet when it comes to their turn to do so you see so much stone walling non responses to court motions and orders and failures to comply such as what we are seeing what has transpired here, so imagine the histrionics employed by Collette when she has put many people in the position she is now facing a judgement of tens of thousands of dollars except now its 100k because she tried to dodge her responsibilities.
I have zero sympathy for Collete or Brigham and I have hear the divorce play card enough times to choke a horse, funny how they speak of divorce but yet are still joined at the hip. This is not the first time Collete and her companies have tried to dodge court order where they have been ordered to pay, there are outstanding ones I believe still not paid by them . Sorry but they both knew exactly what this copyright trolling lawsuit scheme was enrichment under the guise of copyright enforcement or basically another revenue stream. Their sites are still brining in 20k a month and that is just subscribers fees a month it doesn’t included DVD sales or VOD site license income where they have movie content at , not clips they sell etc So there is I believe other income streams out there to be had that they have incoming
Not to mention lets remember Collete has been actively looking at setting up NV companies to get out from under all the problems they are in with their CA companies, this was brought up in a Texas case where Malibu had been in a copyright fight and seem to be on the losing end and a defendant was truing to get assets retrained in case Malibu didnt pay up ( I believe a judge denied defendants request ) SO Collete expects everyone to pay up when they have gotten a judgement but doesn’t think they should when they go against them, just tells you what kind of people your dealing with
Re: Re: Re: Re:
And we are talking about the kind of salt grain that you don’t want to hit your car.
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
"And we are talking about the kind of salt grain that you don’t want to hit your car."
The grain of salt necessary to give anyone associated with Malibu benefit of doubt will cause another yucatan event if it falls from the sky.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
All good points, and I’ll admit to letting the prospect of Schadenfreude prompt me to assume that Colette was even truthful. She’s certainly the sort of high-maintenance trophy spouse whose idea of "sacrifice" is being unable to afford a "$16 million mansion" and being forced to settle for a slightly smaller one, so they can choose to ignore decency laws when filming unauthorized porn in their new kitchen.
Glancing at her Twitter via an @ from FCT’s account, you’d think that everything was fine with Colette until you realize she’s (possibly wisely) not had an update since mid-October. One can only hope that the downfall is truly coming soon.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
Pookie you left off the best part about them renting a private jet to fly to various tropical locations to film more porn (something something no pesky US regulations).
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
Hey TAC hope your well Yes I totally forgot about their COVID dodging om the no shooting porn ban that was going on in LA yet they managed to still be able to do that ( more rules they dont follow, who’d have guessed )
Glad to see their high moral and ethical standards they put profits over health
Re: 'We're in this to GET money not PAY it!'
Apparently Colette claimed that as a result of the lawsuits they filed, her enterprises are running out of money, she and her husband can’t afford lawyers to help with the cases,
Well it’s a good thing that much like other copyright extortionists they made absolutely sure that their would-be targets were flush with cash and more than capable of affording a lawyer to deal with MM’s demands otherwise that would be a hilarious bit of turnabout deserving of zero sympathy but a bunch of mocking laughter.
Re: Re:
"as a result of the lawsuits they filed, her enterprises are running out of money"
Justice is rarely this poetic, but it’s somehow beautiful that the architects of a scheme designed to extort money from people with the threat of lawyers is being brought down by those same lawyers demanding money.
Re: Re: Re:
PROTIP for the court…
Make sure your agents open the shoe boxes in the closet to find the cash to satisfy the debts.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
But but it was for the children TAC, I mean who doesn’t bring home a 150l in a shoe box for future -er -uh child planning,,, of course they didn’t have any yet.,. but just in case…. maybe …one day….probably not
Her future is bright!
"Pelissier reportedly had a complete breakdown. She spoke quickly and panicky, while repeatedly interrupting the Judge, referencing issues that appeared to bear no relation to the case at hand."
Colette Pelissier has a bright future in politics. Very bright, indeed.
Re: Her future is bright!
Either that or on the stage.
Re: Her future is bright!
All she needs is a red hat and an endorsement. I’m sure she can get both from Trump. Blondes involved in adult entertainment is right up his alley after all…or more like that alley he wants to be right up in as it were. Either that or he just likes giving them money.
Re: Her future is bright!
I mean, she’s already had plenty of experience whoring herself out for a different audience.
Re: Re: Her future is bright!
"I mean, she’s already had plenty of experience whoring herself out for a different audience."
She’s a producer, not the actress.
So what she has experience in is just hiring prostitutes and filming them.
Not, mind, that this isn’t also an extensive career-builder in US politics.
Re: Her future is bright!
Bright, like "wicker man" bright?
Re: Her future is bright!
Do we really need another raging dumpster fire lighting up the neighborhood?
Re: Re: Her future is bright!
I dunno, I think we could use someone honest enough to admit they are taking cash to fuck us.
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Only question is: if the original $50K wasn’t enough motivation and the complainant didn’t show is court as required, why didn’t the judge call it contempt of court and give a bit of jail time in addition to adding on another $50K? A couple of days (weeks?) in a cell can be convincing.
Re: Re:
The judge did leverage jail time – it’s why Collette even showed to the hearing.
Given that precedent, it’s likely that additional evasion will result in additional "jail time as consequences" usage.
These are the circumstances (i mean, this is on the ludicrous side but whatever) where i don’t understand why courts don’t put companies into receivership until their shit is payed. Indivisuals have stuff confiscated or go to prison for less.
Re: Re:
Little people don’t own copyrights so they can’t get the special treatment.