NewsBeat

June 2018 NewsBeat 11 By BILL DONAHUE New York 'Copyright Troll' attorney ordered to take ethics class A Manhattan federal judge decided Wednesday to reduce a $10,000 sanction against a "copyright troll" attorney to $2,000, but only after ordering him to complete training in "ethics and professionalism." Though U.S. District Judge Denise Cote said Richard Liebowitz had not expressed "any regret" for the misconduct that led to the sanctions, she said the educational requirement would more "directly address the deficiencies in performance" and better "deter their repetition." "Mr. Liebowitz will be required to complete by July 31, 2018 continuing legal education coursework giving him 4 additional CLE credit hours in ethics and professional-ism beyond those required by the New York State bar authorities," Cote wrote. The order came two weeks after Cote's latest clash with Liebowitz — an attorney who has filed more than 500 photo infringement cases in the Southern District over the past two years. Last month, in a separate case, Cote called him a "known copyright troll." On Feb. 28, Cote ordered Liebowitz to pay $10,000 in sanctions for failing to notify the "mom and pop" office cleaning service he was suing of an important pretrial conference. She also said he made misrepresentations in filings and "needlessly imposed costs on the defendant." "The defendant had expressed a desire to avoid litigation through settlement before Mr. Liebowitz even filed this lawsuit," the judge wrote. "Now, Mr. Liebowitz has abandoned litigation and, presumably, resolved this case privately with the defendant. The defendant has likely expended significant financial — and emotional — resources defending this lawsuit." Earlier this week, Liebowitz asked Cote to reconsider the order, raising several procedural arguments about the way she had imposed the sanctions. In her reduction order Wednesday, the judge seemed to partially agree with those arguments, but did not ease off her fundamental finding that punishment was necessary. "Mr. Liebowitz does not dispute that in at least three separate cases in this district he failed to serve the notices of initial conference, thereby failing to comply with three separate court orders," the judge wrote. "Nor does he express any regret or acknowledgement that he has failed to adhere to the standards expected of officers of this court." The sanctions are the latest critique from the bench for Liebowitz. In October, another Manhattan federal judge ordered him to pay $120,000 in attorneys' fees for filing a case that "no reasonable lawyer with any familiarity with the law of copyright" should have filed. And earlier this month, in yet another case before Judge Cote, she ordered him to pay a $10,000 bond before proceeding, saying he had made key omissions and had thus far litigated the case "irresponsibly." Late Thursday, Liebowitz told Law360 that Judge Cote did not go far enough in reconsidering her original order. "We're glad the district court had another opportunity to opine on the mistake of law in imposing Rule 11 sanctions," he wrote in an emailed statement. "However, we still disagree with the revised decision and are considering our options." — Editing by Bruce Goldman Reprinted from Law 360 (LexisNexis® Company)

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