VICTORY! The Jonmon lawsuit is over! Dismissed voluntarily with prejudice by the plaintiff

[ron_newman]

My awesome lawyer Dan Booth has just informed me that Jonathan Monsarrat's lawyer has filed a Notice of Voluntary Dismissal With Prejudice. This means that the case is OVER, against all defendants, named and unnamed, Doe and Buck alike. "With Prejudice" means that it can never be filed again, against any of us, for any statement in any of the exhibits that were attached to the complaint.

Johnny Monsarrat and his lawyer tried several times to reach a settlement agreement with Dan and me, but for various reasons we ended up rejecting each proposal. In the end, he has simply given up, without any mutual agreement, public or private.

Here's the official text of the notice:

NOTICE OF VOLUNTARY DISMISSAL WITH PREJUDICE

Pursuant to the provisions of Mass. R. Civ. P. 41(a)(1)(i), the Plaintiff, Jonathan Graves Monsarrat, in the above-captioned matter, hereby files and gives notice of dismissal, with prejudice and without costs to either party, as to Deb Filcman, Ron Newman, the Doe Defendant identified as Doe Defendant "srakkt" in paragraph 51 of the Amended Complaint, whose real name is Richard James Scheffler of Somerville, Massachusetts, and John and Jane Does 1-99, as defendants in the Amended Complaint.

ETA: If Johnny had not voluntarily dismissed the lawsuit today, Dan Booth was ready to file this motion to dismiss and this supporting memorandum on Monday. (The supporting memo is the more interesting document.) It would be a shame for Dan to go to all that trouble and not be able to share his work, so I'm linking it here with his permission, for your legal edification.

Comments

[koshmom.livejournal.com]

Let me try to understand what happened here, in a nutshell.
1. jonmon sues multiple people with a stated purpose of hurting them monetarily for causing him imagined harm.
2. They are forced to hire separate multiple lawyers.
3. jonmon threatens more people with being added to the lawsuit, and brags in two press releases that he's intending to harm all these people.
4. jonmon dismisses the lawsuit.

Thus, the upshot is that he has put out the money for one lawyer, and the people he wanted to hurt have put out money for multiple lawyers.

I'd say jonmon has won, because he has succeeded in his purpose of hurting multiple people monetarily.

Yes, I know that Ron doesn't have to pay for council, but Deb (or her employers) and srakkt did. And since a fund was created, those who donated to the fund are out that money too.

IANAL, but can a dismissed suit be countersued for damages? I hope so.

[thetathx1138.livejournal.com]

The key points here, at least for me, were twofold:

1) That Ron not be held accountable for something he did not do.

2) That members of the community be allowed honest and free expression.

I feel no need to reclaim my donation and honestly, I have zero desire to engage in any sort of interaction or discourse with the guy. He's out of my life and he can damn well stay out.

[firstfrost.livejournal.com]

I will count my donation to the fund as helping secure (in moral support, at least) a victory over an unpleasant annoyance. I don't need to have it reframed as a loss. He hasn't won.

[koshmom.livejournal.com]

I do agree with you that he hasn't "won" (I wish I could edit that post) but he has succeeded in his twisted goal. of course, that "success" comes at a cost to his pocketbook and to his credibility. He has succeeded in bullying an entire community. It's a sad state when a person can legally bully a group of people into spending money to defend themselves, especially when he is willing to spend his own money on this bullying.

[thetathx1138.livejournal.com]

So, basically, he made us uncomfortably warm by setting himself on fire?

[jikamens.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately, when it comes to lawsuits and how to respond to them, what is fair and what is most expedient do not always go hand in hand.

In my IANAL opinion, and I think in the opinion as I understand it of several attorneys who have commented on and litigated the suit, it was sufficiently frivolous that if, indeed, it had proceeded, Ron's and Deb's lawyers could have countersued for legal fees and sanctions, and there's a good chance they would have won both.

Having said that, it would have prolonged the lawsuit for months and possibly years, and it would have been hanging over the head of all the defendants during all that time, and it would have given Monsarrat more time to do something irrational like start outing people's real identities just out of spite, and in the end, winning legal fees and/or sanctions was not a sure thing. Therefore, convincing Monsarrat and his lawyers to dismiss the suit with prejudice is by far the more expedient thing to have done.

Furthermore, you have to keep in mind that the fact that Monsarrat filed this lawsuit and ended up dismissing it with prejudice, and the absolutely devastating responses to the lawsuit filed and made public by Ron's and Deb's lawyers, are going to hound Monsarrat for, quite literally, the rest of his life. Stuff like that is On The Record Forever, as he should have known all to well before he sued, since that's essentially what he was suing about!

With all that available in Google to anyone who searches for it, in my opinion Monsarrat doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell of ever again convincing anyone to invest in any venture with which he's involved.

Believe me, now that it's over, this lawsuit is going to hurt him a lot more than it hurt Ron, Deb, and the other defendants.

[ron_newman]

the absolutely devastating responses to the lawsuit filed and made public by Ron's and Deb's lawyers

and also: this motion to dismiss and this supporting memorandum, which Dan Booth was ready to file next Monday if Monsarrat hadn't voluntarily dismissed the case with prejudice today.

It would be a shame if I were the only person who ever got to read these documents, so I've made them public here (with Dan Booth's enthusiastic permission).

[rmd.livejournal.com]

Wow. That supporting memorandum seems like it should be issued by firehose spray. Or like the Hulk doing his "Puny God" smackdown of Loki. (or, to use an older version, like BamBam on the Flintstones thwapping something back and forth)

[gruene.livejournal.com]

This.

I, likewise, would have loved to see Monsarrat pay costs, but what happened is a much better outcome overall.

[thetathx1138.livejournal.com]

This 100%. I'd also note that suing journalists for saying unflattering things about you and issuing unprofessional press releases is a huge red flag for even writers of the lightest and fluffiest of puff pieces. You're forced to ask yourself "Is this guy going to freak out and try to take me to court if some commenter acts like a dick on my website?"

[thespian.livejournal.com]

Did you give anything to the fundraisers?

I'm curious because I think the only people who can say this (that they feel they lost because they spent money on the defense) are in a position to say that it was a loss. If you did, then you're totally in your rights to feel that it was such, but if you didn't, then I don't know that it's for you to say.

[bluesauce.livejournal.com]

Remember in this time of victory that OH GOD THE SKY IS FALLING.

[anyee.livejournal.com]

Oh Koshmom, you bullying, self-righteous so-and-so. I bet you're disappointed because this lawsuit means you can't do the same thing to your detractors, right?

[ron_newman]

That was not necessary.

[pywaket.livejournal.com]

As far as I'm concerned, it puts someone who needs it in her place.

[bluesauce.livejournal.com]

Disagree. While I don't agree with the second sentence, Koshmom acted like a self-righteous bully through this whole thing, so seeing her get called on it isn't surprising.

[rmd.livejournal.com]

Uhhh... That's some impressive escalation, right there.

WOOHOO INTERNET DISCOURSE STAY AWESOME.

[pywaket.livejournal.com]

+1

[bombardiette.livejournal.com]

Wow. Only in DSLJ could great news for the community at large be met with such a snide top level comment and devolve so quickly.

[thetathx1138.livejournal.com]

This, +1, Internets won, etc.

[litia2005.livejournal.com]

Is there anyone left in the neighborhood who still does not know who this guy is and what he did? I would not want to live in a place where everybody hates me, all I can say.

[diego001.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately, I think that would be the entire East Coast by now.

[srakkt.livejournal.com]

It's usually pretty amusing when a liar gets so thoroughly called out on their horseshit by their local community that they have to literally pack up and move away.

[thetathx1138.livejournal.com]

Also, I dislike the phrasing of "out that money". I am not "out" anything. A gift freely given to a friend in need, a person whom I view as one of the most decent I know, in fact, is never a loss.

[bluesauce.livejournal.com]

Well said.