Catherine Crier Takes a Dallas "John Doe" to Court Over ... Her Wikipedia Page
By Robert Wilonsky in Crime and Punishment
Thursday, May. 21 2009 @ 8:30AM
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Yesterday in Dallas County District Court, Crier and her attorney -- Joe Kendall, himself a former federal judge -- filed this lawsuit against a thus-far unknown John Doe who, they allege, has been using a Richardson-based ISP to post nasty things about Crier on her Wikipedia page. Among the things this man or woman has posted, according to the lawsuit: Crier's been a murder suspect, a shoplifter, she's served jail time, she's been disbarred -- none of which are true. Turns out, Crier knows where these scurrilous factoids came from: a 2007 Dallas Morning News story about ... attorney Catherine Shelton, about whom we've written plenty.
Crier says the John Doe knowingly changed the names, and, as a result, she's suffered "public hatred, contempt, and ridicule," and that the Wiki entry "impeached [her] honesty, integrity, virtue, and reputation." Hence, her demand for damages including "lost wages, emotional distress and mental anguish." I filed a similar suit after seeing the 2006 Robin Williams movie Man of the Year, in which Crier has a small role.
It will be interesting to see how this plays out. Unfortunately, the entity that is truly responsible for organizing and maintaining the world's most potent defamation platform -- the Wikimedia Foundation -- is largely protected by the terms of Section 230 of the CDA. So, if our beleaguered heroine is unable to match 75.16.196.192 to a specific individual (for example, a home-based customer of a particular ISP, rather than (again, for example) a 14-year-old playing on the public Internet terminal at the county library), she's going to be completely out of luck.
And Wikipedia will go on promoting defamation against her, and others like her, while the articles about the most famous board members of the Wikimedia Foundation enjoy indefinite "edit protection" and "admin watchlisting" of THEIR articles. They refuse to eat their own dogfood at the WMF, and that's a disgrace.
Crier should look into forming a legal class action, along with Taner Akcam, Fuzzy Zoeller, John Siegenthaler, Walter Mondale, and all the other innocent victims of Wikipedia's libel machine.
Posted On: Thursday, May. 21 2009 @ 11:48AMIt seems D Magazine is now Dallas' most potent defamation platform now that the comments are gone. No one can keep the editorial staff in check.
Posted On: Thursday, May. 21 2009 @ 2:30PMIt would be great to put this on Robert Wilonsky's Wikipedia page
Posted On: Thursday, May. 21 2009 @ 4:57PMNo, but it would make me sound considerably more interesting than a former cheerleader-turned-blog editor. And, technically, I am a shoplifter: When I was 3, I took a pack of gum from Lantrip's Pharmacy, though my mother made me return it. No jail time, but I couldn't play with my Raggedy Andy for an hour.
Posted On: Thursday, May. 21 2009 @ 5:05PMWikipedia should do an educational promotion on Biographies of Living persons. They have tougher policies, but lack enforcement. It might play out like Youtube and the DMCA lawsuit they had; Wikipedia is free, Cier is responsible for her own entry. She can just subscribe to the RSS feed, every time the article's edited (about 3 times a month) she can take a peek at the diff. If it gets bad she can request page protection. There are a lot of administrators, I would imagine, that would be sympathetic.
Posted On: Friday, May. 22 2009 @ 12:56AMI have a Wikipedia Biography as well, and I sympathize with Judge Crier.
Having a Biography on Wikipedia is like watching a drive by shooting in
slow motion over and over again.
I actually appeared in front of Catherine Crier in my first technology
lawsuit against IBM(Computer People) in 1988 in Dallas Texas when she was
a judge. I had filed for sanctions against the other side in this dispute
and she dismissed their case for me.
This was about a month before she took the job as a journalist.
Well, the person who did this is located in Oklahoma City.
[root@fedora ~]# nslookup 75.16.196.192
Server: 166.70.238.41
Address: 166.70.238.41#53
Non-authoritative answer:
192.196.16.75.in-addr.arpa name =
75-16-196-192.lightspeed.okcyok.sbcglobal.net.
Authoritative answers can be found from:
196.16.75.in-addr.arpa nameserver = ns3.sbcglobal.net.
196.16.75.in-addr.arpa nameserver = ns1.swbell.net.
196.16.75.in-addr.arpa nameserver = ns2.swbell.net.
ns2.swbell.net internet address = 151.164.11.218
ns1.swbell.net internet address = 151.164.1.1
ns3.sbcglobal.net internet address = 65.68.49.6
This system also appears to be offline and using dynamic IP addresses as
my probes of the address indicate no live system on this IP at this time
on any ports, and if it is online, it’s most likely a Windows XP system.
You will need to request who was assigned this address for the specific
dates/times referenced in the complaint.
Know anyone in Oklahoma City?
And here is the exact geographic location of the computer who used this
address. Located in the Northwestern section of Oklahoma City.
75.16.196.192
Oklahoma City
Coordinates 35.5423 -97.6189
Zip Code 73132
Somewhere near the physcial address of
6902 N MacArthur Blvd, Warr Acres, OK, United States
Between 70th street and 68th Street to the east side of McArthur Blvd in
the Oklahoma City Suburbs. This area on detail maps indicates the IP
address was used by one of the residential homes within 40 yards of this
physical address.
Close as I can get without a subpoena. Amazing what you can do with
todays internet.
Jeff
Posted On: Saturday, May. 23 2009 @ 1:18AMCatherine Crier requested help with her complaint about a third party from the Wikipedia community, and was given all the help she asked for. I don't think Wikipedia is her target at all.
A big difference to some above who acted like truculent children, got warned, ignored the warnings, got banned, and now spend their lives hanging round looking for places to post the latest "why we all hate wikiPedia and so should you" every chance they get.
Posted On: Sunday, May. 24 2009 @ 8:54AMWikipedia is nothing but a libel mill used by Jimmy Wales to extort money from people with Bios. He's been caught doing it in more than one instance.
Like most tyrants, his response is to ban anyone who cuts off the payments to his online stalking mill or who calls him out on his conduct. The people who prowl around and patrol Wikipedia are nothing more than trolls and stalkers.
The entire Wikipedia model is online stalking. I note that as usual, Wikipedia has already destroyed all the evidence of this persons conduct who posted these lies by erasing all the articles edit history and I can be certain Wikimedia will refuse to produce any of the webserver access logs to Judge Crier.
Wikipedia's model is to use fear to attempt to control its admins(stalkers) and others who visit the site. I still have three months left to file suit against Mr. Wales and his associates under Utah's Statute of Limitations for extorting $5,000.00 from me to correct my bio. If I see another such post as the one above, I file file suit and watch Mr. Wales and his cronies ban you.
:-)
Jeff
Posted On: Sunday, May. 24 2009 @ 10:18PMJeff, I'm taking it that since you have not made any attempt to recoup $5,000 of extortion money, and are unlikely to do so, the situation is more complex, or even wholly different, than the one you describe above.
If the situation was "Let's take this minor litigious person, keep his biography negative, hold it ransom until he gives us thousands of dollars, and then prop him up once the money has been exchanged" I doubt you would only be complaining on a blog. You would have launched a lawsuit--you seem to be one of those 'lawsuit waiting to happen' people--and would be far less sanguine. Your multiple lawsuits for various issues are documented on the Internet. It must be nice to be known as one of those types of people. It's also interesting that, even though you released a press release about all of this, it went nowhere despite that its charges would make for an extraordinary scandal the papers would eat up. You are opening yourself up to libel lawsuits.
And it's also interesting to note that you never really gave them money, right?
Posted On: Tuesday, May. 26 2009 @ 10:52AMThis is the usual drill for the koolaid drinking hoards over at Wikipedia to make statements about people being banned at their site. Unfortunately, reality is much more complex than these children would like to believe.
Fact: vandalism on Wikipedia does harm to real people and can sometimes create problems in their daily lives.
Fact: vandalism on Wikipedia lasts much longer than the Wikimedia foundation would like everyone to believe. This study is currently being studied at a Belgium University .
Fact: Pseudonymous users regularly use Wikipedia to push their individual agendas, often in the context of their jobs and then attack others for attempting to do the same things using real identities and declared interests.
It would appear that perhaps more people are finally realizing what is happening here. Hopefully, this trial will be one way to finally address these very real issues which affect very real people.
Posted On: Tuesday, May. 26 2009 @ 11:04AMI have demanded Wikimedia return the $5,000.00 they extorted, and the matter was discussed with Mike Goodwin.
His response was they would not return the money but would continue to police the bio, which they are doing. He also threatened me with legal action if I pushed the matter.
More recently, Wales libeled me in an interview with Reuters in Brazil, and I will be sending some papers their way at some point -- after I collect more evidence and indict a few folks for stalking -- so I have a good case against Wikimedia.
Any more questions?
:-)
Jeff
Posted On: Tuesday, May. 26 2009 @ 1:48PMAnd as an FYI, I did file a police complaint with the San Francisco Police against Mike Goodwin and Wikimedia, and they are being watched -- for civil extortion.
Just so you know what's up here.
:-)
Jeff
Posted On: Tuesday, May. 26 2009 @ 1:49PM"Godwin". (Sorry.)
Posted On: Tuesday, May. 26 2009 @ 4:15PMPaul, you write the following:
Pseudonymous users regularly use Wikipedia to push their individual agendas, often in the context of their jobs and then attack others for attempting to do the same things using real identities and declared interests.
But when I googled your name, the information out there is that you did exactly that under numerous names, and that's why you were thrown off of Wikipedia?
Posted On: Tuesday, May. 26 2009 @ 4:18PM@the pseudo anonymous "Um Yeah", you've got my real name. Via Akahele, you can also get information about what I do. What do we know about you?
More importantly, what do we know about the anonymous blogs to which you refer on the internet? Who made them and why?
What does this tell us about anonymous posters who make accusations about people who are identified? Who is more credible?
If you want to have a conversation about this, why don't you begin by introducing yourself, as civilized people usually do? Then we can decide whether or not to believe you.
...Isn't this one of the reasons why Judge Crier took this to court in the first place?
Posted On: Tuesday, May. 26 2009 @ 4:39PMSo...your response to an accusation that you have done what you criticize others for doing, with a link to a blog that has links to Wikipedia showing it to be true, is to instead question the identity of the accuser?
And we are supposed to care about your criticism why...?
Posted On: Tuesday, May. 26 2009 @ 5:12PM@Jason Cairnes
That is often the problem--Wikipedia has it's own myriad issues, but with some of the critics, if you call out their own hypocritical standards, all they can do is "deflect".
Funny that, though the chaps complain that fellows like Jimmy Wales refer to the critics as "trolls", they in turn refer to those that expose their own double-dealing that got them kicked from Wikipedia, they call THOSE trolls as well.
Glass houses, and all that. Or they lost at the game, and now are just sore about that.
Posted On: Tuesday, May. 26 2009 @ 6:24PMI have to chuckle at this notion of being kicked/blocked/banned/shut-out/etc. from Wikipedia. I have been "community banned" (after a 14-hour vote involving about seven editors I'd never even heard of) from the English Wikipedia. However, I have accounts in welcome good standing at numerous other Wikimedia Foundation projects.
Not only that, but I have a handful of "sleeper" accounts on the English Wikipedia, which are able to edit whenever and however they wish to -- even publishing an occasional paid-editing product onto Wikipedia -- all without so much as a hint of flak from the Wikipediot horde. All I have to do is never mention my real name. The same way the anonymity policy protects the Wikipediots, it now protects my edits the same way. Am I helping Wikipedia? Or am I subverting it? You'll never know.
So, prance about saying "Ah ha, we blocked you", all you want. Because, in fact, you haven't blocked me at all.
Posted On: Tuesday, May. 26 2009 @ 11:06PMI don't know what's sadder: the people who prance about saying "Ah ha, we blocked you" or the guy they say it to, who has such disdain for a website that he is so obviously emotionally invested in.
"Ah ha - we banned you from our club!"
"Ah ha - no you didn't, because your club sucks, and I wear disguises to be part of it. So nyeh!" Then you come on here saying you are doing the same things ("sleeper accounts" etc.) that you think are so awful about the site.
As someone who casually checks the site with a critical eye, both Wikipedia people and their critics sound like they are all cut from the same cloth. There appears to be very little different about any of you, yet you all point fingers while you do the same things that you criticize the other side for doing.
Face it: you're all part of a big game that you dress up in larger terms of expanding free knowledge or in fighting the ill effects on society of a website.
Posted On: Tuesday, May. 26 2009 @ 11:25PMJason Cairns, are you the web developer / health advocate, or some other Jason Cairns? If the former, have you marketed (for free) your domains on my website, MyWikiBiz?
This is actually "on topic" to your complaint about me. You see, the difference with my participation in Wikipedia is that (now) I do so for my own personal benefit, and even then, rarely. I also spend about 5 times more time and effort working on MyWikiBiz and Akahele than I do on Wikipedia-related matters. The Wikipediot swarm are, on the other hand, addicted to their site -- spending hour after productive hour, every day, toiling away on a flawed architecture. The main reason why I simultaneously complain of *and* exploit the anonymity practices at Wikipedia is because I FULLY TRIED to go the above-board, full-disclosure route, from the outset. For that honorable approach, I was harassed, insulted, called names, and banned for wanting to do that, even though I pointed out numerous times that it was completely possible for me (or any average Arbitration Committee member using an alias like "Sam Blacketer") to do exactly what I was doing, but under the cloak of anonymity, so why didn't Wikipedians tighten up the policies surrounding anonymity? "No! No! No, we must have our anonymity, to protect the poor Tibetan dissident who must be able to edit Wikipedia", they all chimed back at me.
I found that to be a bogus, disproportionate defense of the anonymity policy (i.e., a strawman to disguise the real reasons for maintaining site-wide anonymity policies -- POV-pushing, hidden agenda implementation, and ease of revenge practices), and so, I have decided that my ability to feed my family, or donate to my church or to Doctors Without Borders, with money gained from editing GFDL content for modest payment, morally outweighs the Wikipediot position. Besides, one may easily argue that the content I am adding to Wikipedia bears a "neutral point of view" (because I am an ethical author, not interested in straight PR puff), and it is being read by dozens or hundreds of readers each day (yes, I check page traffic statistics on "my" articles) -- so consumers are being served, rather than encountering a blank page.
If someone wants to villify me for this state of affairs, that the Wikipedia governance itself encouraged, that's fine. I can be a convenient whipping boy for those too addled to think more clearly about it.
Posted On: Wednesday, May. 27 2009 @ 8:45AMWikipedia is a stalking mill designed to stroke the egos of social reprobates and other fringe groups who don't belong in normal society. The people who are there long term and essentially live there for the most part fit the profiles of true sociopaths.
Wales developed a great gaming system on Wikipedia which he uses to attract the dregs of society -- people who don't have lives are who aspire to be "famous and great" are is marks and he's come up with a rat maze to lure in the stupid, lonley, and ignorant.
I've been famous and in the public eye for what now -- 15 years? I have to say, power, fame, and attribution are overrated. There's a simple wisdom is simply accepting who you are and being happy about it. None of the psycho trolls on Wikipedia seem happy, it's a perpetual war zone and highly competitive. But what elludes all of them is the cheese at the end of the maze -- there is none -- just the smell of cheese.
Wales and his cronies just whore all of these idiots through their "Wikigame" (The site is an online gaming system essentially -- see who can get to the end as an "Admin" or "Arbitor"). Wikimedia then cashes in on everyone's hard work.
When was the last time Wales took one of his admins to get a massage as a russian house of ill repute on Wikimedia's dime? But HE DOES.
Bottom line, its a bunch of morons being used to run his business for free, while his cronies back at the Wikimedia offices cash in on everyones hard work and pay themselves 300K+ salaries per year, divert and misappropriate the funds and live the good life by living in fancy hotels and eating fancy meals while the rest of the stupid schmucks live in their mom's basement or their trailer parks in New Jersey and Alabama while Wales and his cronies cash in on YOUR HARD WORK.
It's got to be the second biggest scam after Linux development. Linus Torvalds has a similar model. Let people "contribute" so they feel good about themselves, while the project and site owners rake in the $$$.
P.T. Barnum said is best,
"There's a sucker born every minute".
Anyone who spends more than 3 minutes a day is in this category as far as I am concerned.
:-)
Jeff
Posted On: Wednesday, May. 27 2009 @ 9:30AMYou forgot to mentiond that Catherine Crier use to work for ESPN/ABC Sports as their horse racing analyst.
Posted On: Sunday, May. 31 2009 @ 10:20PM