Legal Documents

Legal documents from the Netzilla legal case. This is an incomplete list because I've misplaced some of them, and because others are redundant.

If anybody has good OCR software which could convert these to text, please get in touch with me.

Items shown in green are from my side. Items in black are from Reynolds. Items in orange are from Ritz. Items in blue are from the court. Items in violet are from the RIAA.

5 Apr 2004: The lawsuit that started it all -- Kimberly Reynolds sues her employee.
15 Apr 2004: Response.
25 Aug 2004: Initial demand letter to me from Reynolds
14 Oct 2004: Second demand letter from Reynolds
14 Feb 2005: Complaint in Doe v Falk -- details Reynolds' complaints.
16 Feb 2005: Summons in Doe v Falk
19 Apr 2005: Motion to admit Harristhal to try this case in ND
19 May 2005: Summons in Sierra v Ritz
19 May 2005: Summons in Sierra v Ritz -- details Reynolds' complaint against Ritz
31 May 2005: Order to Preserve -- orders Ritz to preserve evidence
7 Jun 2005: Order for Expedited Discovery -- permission to copy Ritz's disks
14 Jun 2005: Summons to appear in court
14 Jun 2005: Amended Complaint, Sierra v Ritz
14 Jun 2005: Another copy of Summons and Complaint, Doe v Falk
11 Jul 2005: Another copy of Summons, Complaint, and other docs, Sierra v Ritz
11 Jul 2005: Another copy of Summons and Complaint, Doe v Falk
14 July 2005 Criminal charges against Ritz (5 pages)
25 July 2005 State's evidence against Ritz (69 pages)
Ritz is charged with doing DNS lookups and whois lookups. Document includes Brad Allison's claims that Ritz "unlawfully accessed" Sierra's servers, a letter from the investigating officer, a usenet post by Ritz, a copy of the information Ritz posted on line, and a copy of the Fargo Forum article about me.
21 Jul 2005: Motion opposing stay of proceedings, Sierra v Ritz
21 Jul 2005: Motion opposing stay of proceedings, Sierra v Ritz
Claims that Ritz or someone helping him is attacking Sierra's servers
Affidavit of James Roeder Very light on detail as to what allegedly happened. I suspect that he's referring to a DNS lookup.
Affidavit of Harristhal.
22 Jul 2005: Notice of taking Geeks.org deposition
25 Jul 2005: Adding sol.net to Sierra v Ritz
25 Jul 2005: Motion for preliminary injunction.
25 Jul 2005: Letter formally informing me that I'm not to access Sierra's computers
Note: in July, my lawyer, Gregory Broiles, informed Reynolds' lawyer that they were to deal with him from now on. You can see that Harristhal has received that notice by the fact that this letter is CC'd to Broiles.
27 July 2005: Second affidavit of James Roeder, Sierra v Ritz
Claim that Ritz "connected" to Sierra servers on 29 June.
Note: Roeder writes "We determined that the rr.com IP address was assigned to David Ritz by doing an nslookup." But this is exactly what Ritz is accused of cyber-crime for doing.
2 Aug 2005: Filing of injunction
Note: This is the court order used by Reynolds to censor netnews posts from the Google archive. See Chilling Effects case file.
2 Aug 2005: Documents received from Geeks.org, Supernews, Dyndns
DynDNS cover page.
Login times
Geeks.org affidavit
Supernews affidavit
Revised application for TRO
3 Aug 2005: Request for Subpeonas, Sierra v Ritz
Request for records from sol.net
Affidavit from Harristhal
Order to depose sol.net
Application for subpeona
Subpeona
18 Aug 2005: Amended Order for Disclosure from RoadRunner, Sierra v Ritz
22 Aug 2005: Request for information from me, Sierra v Ritz
Note: Here we see that Harristhal has not cc'd my lawyer on this letter. Harristhal succeeded in pulling this fast one on me for nearly a month. Since I thought that my lawyer was receiving copies of all legal documentation, I paid very little attention to them. It wasn't until much later that my lawyer and I realized that Harristhal had taken my lawyer out of the loop.
22 Aug 2005: Demand for evidence.
Wants all computers I used in 2004 and 2005, all files, all correspondance I ever had with anybody about Sierra, and so on. It's a very long list.
22 Aug 2005: Google Censored.
Harristhal faxes a copy of the 2 Aug 2005 court order to Google, and demands that Google remove all traces of the spamkiller.net discussion from their servers. Google gets far too many such cease-and-desist letters to fight them all, and so they simply comply without arguing validity. More info available at Chilling Effects case file.
22 Aug 2005: Judge Irby assigned to Sierra v Ritz
22 Aug 2005: Notice of taking deposition of Ritz
31 Aug 2005: Motion to compel discovery from me, Sierra v Ritz
2 Sep 2005: Motion for expedited discovery
Motion for expedited discovery
Notice of motion
Argument for expedited discovery
Proposed order for expedited Discovery
6 Sep 2005: Judge Webb assigned to Doe v Falk
6 Sep 2005: Affidavit of service, Doe v Falk
6 Sep 2005: Affidavit of service, Sierra v Ritz
9 Sep 2005: Request for order to depose a2i
9 Sep 2005: Schedule motion for contempt
13 Sep 2005: Notice of taking deposition of Ritz
20 Sep 2005: Protective order between Sierra & Ritz
Parties agree that certain confidential documents will not be shared.
21 Sep 2005: Copies of Ritz's disks given to Ritz
22 Sep 2005: Proposed order to depose a2i
22 Sep 2005: Proposed order to depose Rahul Desi
27 Sep 2005: Another disk copied from Ritz
27 Sep 2005: Records subpeonaed from RoadRunner
30 Sep 2005: Motion for contempt, Sierra v Ritz
30 Sep 2005: Motion for default judgement against me, Sierra v Ritz
Note: my lawyer still not included in the correspondance.
Motion for default judgement against me
Motion for default judgement
Memorandum of law in support of default judgement
Harristhal affidavit
Proposed order for default judgement
30 Sep 2005: Notice of motion for contempt
Motion for contempt
Memorandum of law in support of contempt motion
Affidavit of Harristhal
Affidavit of Lesa Kraft
Proposed order of contempt
12 Oct 2005: Notice of taking deposition of Ritz
21 Oct 2005: Amended Notice of Motion for Contempt
21 Oct 2005: Motion for protective order and default judgement, Doe v Falk
Note: my lawyer still not included in the correspondance.
Motion for protective order and default judgement, Doe v Falk
Memorandum of law in support of default judgement
Affidavit of Harristhal
Proposed entry of default judgement
Affidavit of service by U.S. Mail -- you can do this?
26 Oct 2005?: Subpeona to appear at McDonough Holland & Allen, PC, Oakland CA.I am ordered to appear for a deposition and to bring my computers.
Note: I came back from vacation and found this taped to my front door; I have no idea how long it was there.
Blank proof of service form.
Order to expedite discovery and produce documents and things
Another copy of subpeona
Affidavit from Stephen Lerner, McDonough Holland & Allen
Copy of order to preserve evidence.
9 Nov 2005: Letter from Michelle Donarski informing Harristhal that she will be my ND lawyer.
9 Nov 2005: Proposed order dismissing default judgement, Doe v Falk
11 Nov 2005: Motion to consolidate cases.
Motion to consolidate
Brief in support of motion
Proposed order to consolidate
11 Nov 2005: Requests for copies of documents
15 Nov 2005: Motion to vacate default judgement, Sierra v Ritz
During the time when I didn't realize my lawyer wasn't seeing any of this legal paperwork, a default judgement was made against me in ND. The first thing Michelle did was have it reversed.
clerk's copy
Notice of motion to vacate default judgement
Brief in support of motion
Proposed order to vacate
Affidavit of service
23 Nov 2005: Motion to dismiss based on jurisdiction, Sierra v Ritz
clerk's copy
Notice of Motion and motion to dismiss
Brief in support of motion
Affidavit of Ed Falk
Affidavit of Michelle Donarski Includes public information about Sierra
Proposed order to dismiss
23 Nov 2005: Motion to dismiss based on jurisdiction, Doe v Falk
Note: pretty much the same as above, but for Doe v Falk instead of Sierra v Ritz
clerk's copy
Notice of Motion and motion to dismiss
Brief in support of motion
Affidavit of Ed Falk
Affidavit of Michelle Donarski
Proposed order to dismiss
Proposed order for judgement in my favor
Proposed judgement
27 Nov 2005: David Ritz Deposition
6 Dec 2005: Reynolds' response to my affidavit, Ritz v Sierra
6 Dec 2005: Reynolds' response to my affidavit, Doe v Falk
7 Dec 2005: Memorandum of law opposing motion to dismiss, Doe v Falk
Plaintiffs Memorandum of Law in Opposition To Motion To Dismiss on Jurisdiction Claims that I'm subject to jurisdiction in ND based on events that happened mostly in response to the commencement of this lawsuit. Claims that I'm in the "inner circle" and the "cabal" with Ritz. Claims that because I sent information to Donarski about Reynolds, that I participated in a lawsuit in ND in 2004 and that means that ND has jurisdiction over me now. More arguments as to why I can be considered to be under ND jurisdiction.
Affidavit of Harristhal
Exhibit A: copy of 2004 letter from Donarski in Sierra v Rogne
Snapshots of newsfeeds.com web pages
Snapshot of my Netzilla case file. 1st page only reproduced here; see www.rahul.net/falk/Nz/ for the whole thing.
Exhibit B: Ritz deposition; referenced several times in Harristhal Affidavit
Exhibit C: copy of 25 Aug 2004 demand letter
Exhibit D: copy of 14 Oct 2004 demand letter
Exhibit E: Affidavits of Delozier, Reynolds
Reynolds exhibit A: Screenshot of www.rahul.net/falk/Nz
Reynolds exhibit B: Screenshot of www.rahul.net/falk/
Reynolds exhibit C: Screenshot of Fargo Forum article
Reynolds exhibit D: Newer screenshot of www.rahul.net/falk/
Reynolds exhibit E: Screenshot of Lawsuit info page
Reynolds exhibit F: Screenshot of usenet message
In this exhibit, Reynolds claims that this message constitutes harassment of newsfeeds, but if you read the text of the message, you'll see that "admin@newsfeeds.com" ends a message with "Any questions?" and my followup was a one-line question. Cleary this exchange -- on a public forum, not in email -- was initiated by Reynolds and not by me. How this could be construed as harassment is beyond me.
Reynolds exhibit G: Screenshot of usenet message
Yet another response to a response to a newsfeeds post. Oddly enough, I'm defending newsfeeds in this post. Hardly harassment. Also directed at Andrew Gierth, not Reynolds.
Reynolds exhibit H: Snapshot of Chilling Effects article.
Supposedly, this affidavit is to establish my connections to North Dakota for the purpose of jurisdiction. However, as far as I know, Chilling Effects isn't in North Dakota. On top of which, I have nothing to do with Chilling Effects. The Chilling Effects case file was created as a direct result of Reynolds' demand letter to Google censoring several usenet posts. I only became aware of this case file after the fact.
Reynolds exhibit I: Another copy of exhibit G
Reynolds exhibit J: Another copy of exhibit F
Exhibit A: Copy of letter telling Ritz I was being sued and needed a lawyer.
How this relates to jurisdiction is anybody's guess.
Exhibit B: Copy of letter asking other anti-spammers for information to help in my case.
Again, how this relates to jurisdiction is anybody's guess.
Exhibit C: Copy of letter from Howard Knight congratulating Ritz for noticing that his servers were being probed by Reynolds' lawyers
Exhibit D: Copy of letter from me thanking Ritz.
Exhibit E: Copy of letters between Ritz and Dave Forster of the Fargo Forum
Exhibit F: Copy of messages between Ritz and another anti-spammer.
Exhibit G: Copy of 1997 letter from me to "inner-circle" mailing list, providing information about Netzilla.
Exhibit H: Copy of letter from me to Ritz asking for documentation to help Donarski in her 2004 Sierra v Rogne lawsuit.
7 Dec 2005: Memorandum of law opposing motion to dismiss, Sierra v Ritz
Almost identical to the previous brief; I've only scanned the first pages of these documents.
Affidavit of Harristhal
Exhibit A: deposition of Ritz (see above)
Exhibit B: deposition of Falk
Affidavit of Brad Allison
Plaintiff's memorandum of law
Long list of reasons why North Dakota should have jurisdiction; some of them bizarre.
DeLozier affidavit
Doe's notice of motion to modify protective order
Request to unseal more records taken from Ritz
19 Dec 2005: Reply Brief in Support of Motion to Dismiss for Lack of Personal Jurisdiction, Sierra v Ritz
cover letter for clerk
Reply Brief -- responses to Reynolds' arguments opposing change of jurisdiction.
Affidavit of Donarski -- Includes copies of Complaint and Answer filed in Rover's Playhouse, LLC v. Becky Black -- the case I helped with (slightly) and which launched Doe v. Falk. This is a good document to read, as it gives you an insight on how the Reynolds work. Of special interest are items 27, 32, 34, and 35. Also included are other documents refuting claims made by Reynolds.
affidavit of service
19 Dec 2005: Reply Brief -- same as above, Doe v. Falk
Reply Brief
Affidavit of Donarski
affidavit of service
21 Dec 2005: Request to allow testimony via phone, Doe v Falk
21 Dec 2005: Request to allow testimony via phone, Sierra v Ritz
6 Jan 2006: David Ritz Deposition
9 Jan 2006: TRO forbidding me from including information about Sierra on my web site.
12 Jan 2006: Request for admission that I used whois, Sierra v Ritz & Falk
I could not make stuff like this up.
12 Jan 2006: Request for admission that I used whois, Sierra v Ritz.
17 Jan 2006: Motion to allow testimony by video conference, Doe v Falk
Normally, testimony by phone or video conference is a routine thing and regularly allowed. However, since the purpose of this lawsuit is to run up legal expenses on my part, Reynolds' lawyer Harristhal has refused. This means another round of motion and counter-motion, just to determine whether or not I need to travel to North Dakota just for a hearing on whether or not I need to travel to North Dakota for the trial.
17 Jan 2006: Motion to allow testimony by video conference, Sierra v Ritz & Falk
Same as above. Only first page scanned. Rest available on request.
23 Jan 2006: Motion to admit Pete Wellborn Pro Hac Vice
This is a formal request to the court to allow an out-of-state attorney to join the lawsuit.
26 Jan 2006: Demand that my lawyer turn over all communications with me prior to July 2005
27 Jan 2006: Response from my lawyer telling Harristhal to take a hike.
30 Jan 2006: Plaintiff's Memorandum in Opposition to Defendant's Motion on Testimony at Evidentiary Hearing (11 pages)
Among other things, asserts that I want to allow David Ritz to testify via telephone because David has a warrant out against him, and that his extreme ill health has nothing to do with it.
1 Feb 2006: Our response, arguing in favor of electronic testimony
1 Feb 2006: Our objection to Reynolds' motion to modify protective order
Update: We won this one.
16 Feb 2006: My direct testimony affidavit with respect to jurisdiction.
17 Feb 2006: John Levine's direct testimony affidavit with respect to jurisdiction.
John Levine gives his opinion on whether my web page is "targeted" at North Dakota, whether or not it's interactive, and whether or not it's commercial in nature. Also includes a copy of his CV, which is worth reading by itself.
18 Feb 2006: Harristhal's affidavit with respect to jurisdiction.
18 Feb 2006: Brad Allison's affidavit with respect to jurisdiction.
Allison is Reynolds' sysadmin
23 Feb 2006: Allison's response to our affidavits
27 Feb 2006: Objection to Subpoena
Harristhal wanted copies of private correspondences between myself and my lawyer from before she was my lawyer.
28 Feb 2006: Court Transcript, evidentiary hearing on jurisdiction, Doe v Falk. (pdf version)
Note that the text version contains a few small spelling and grammar corrections. The pdf version is uncorrected.
8 Mar 2006: Direct Testimony Affidavit of Ed Falk, Sierra v Ritz
Not significantly different from my 16-Feb-2006 affidavit in the Doe v Falk case. Discusses the "inner-circle" list and my communications with Ritz. Brief discussion of DNS queries.
8 Mar 2006: Direct Testimony Affidavit of John Levine, Sierra v Ritz
See page 8, paragraph 52
9 Mar 2006: Order Granting Defendant's Motion to Dismiss, Doe v Falk
9 Mar 2006: Second Affidavit of Harristhal, with exhibits, Sierra v Ritz & Falk
9 Mar 2006: Second Affidavit of Brad Allison, with exhibits, Sierra v Ritz & Falk
21 Mar 2006: Court Transcript, evidentiary hearing on jurisdiction, Sierra v Falk & Ritz.
(142 pages, flat ascii.)
28 Mar 2006: Official notice that evidentiary hearing is to be continued on 9 May
29 Mar 2006: Request for summary judgement, Sierra v Falk & Ritz
This totals something like 160 pages. Either Reynolds is paying Harristhal by the word, or Harristhal thinks he can baffle the judge with bullshit. Does Harristhal actually think the judge is going to just issue a summary judgement in their favor out of the blue? My best guess is that Harristhal knows we're going to shred what's left of his claim that Ritz committed some sort of cyber crime, and is hoping to get a judgement before the judge learns the facts.
Cover pages
Affidavit of Service
Plaintiff's Notice of Motion and Motion for Partial Summary Judgement
Plaintiff's Memorandum of Law In Support Of Its Motion For Partial Summary Judgement (21 pages)
Summary of facts in the case, allegations of harm, citations of relavent laws.
Affidavit of James Roeder
Another copy of Roeder's July affidavit in which he explains how he needs to make another copy of Ritz's disks.
Second Affidavit of James Roeder
Assertion that Ritz accessed Sierra servers via proxies.
Affidavit of Lesa Kraft In Support Of Motion For Contempt
Claim that Ritz site is still up, despite court order.
Affidavit of Lesa Kraft In Support of Motion for Damages Against Defendant Falk (32 pages)
Summary of Sierra's expenses in coming after Ritz & myself.
Affidavit of Christopher J Harristhal on Partial Summary Judgement Motion
Exhibit A: Excerpts from Ritz Deposition (37 pages).
Exhibit B: Ritz did a DNS zone transfer
Exhibit C: Logs of failed telnet attempts.
Exhibit D: Mention of nmap port scan.
Exhibit E: Chat log, Ritz & 'mopflite' discussing how ridiculous Sierra's claims are.
Exhibit F: Ritz asks Spamcon for advice in the lawsuit and talks about how sick he is in a letter to Porter Clark.
Exhibit G: Ritz tells someone what he's alleged to have done.
Exhibit H: Discussion of proposed UDP against newsfeeds, and how Ritz has to stay out of it.
Exhibit I: More discussion of proposed UDP against newsfeeds.
Exhibit J: Westlaw citations relavent to the case (14 pages).
Exhibit K: Westlaw citations relavent to the case (6 pages).
Exhibit L: Westlaw citations relavent to the case (9 pages).
Affidavit of Brad Allison in Support of Partial Summary Judgement Motion
Quote of Sierra's login prompt which tells unauthorized people to go away.
Order Granting Plaintiff's Motion for Partial Summary Judgement
This is what they hope the judge will sign.
31 Mar 2006: Plaintiff's Second Requests for Admissions to Defendant David Ritz
Sierra wants Ritz to admit he wasn't authorized to do a DNS transfer.
3 Apr 2006: Plaintiff's Memorandum on Law on Calling Rebuttal Witnesses
In a nutshell, Harristhal is claiming that our testimony that dns transfers aren't illegal was sprung on him without warning, and now he wants permission from the court to get some more expert witnesses. Perhaps he should have taken the time to read John Levine's affidavit, above, when we submitted it.
14 April 2006: Plaintiff's Reply Memorandum of law in support of calling rebuttal witnesses
Bunch of blah blah on whether Reynolds had to allege conspiracy in order to get co-conspirator jurisdiction over me. He keeps insisting that I waived the issue of co-conspirator jurisdiction.
18 April 2006: Additional Objection to Plaintiff's Memorandum to Call Rebuttal Witnesses.
Cover letter
Legal Brief
21 April 2006: Order Denying Plaintiff's Request to Call Rebuttal Witnesses (2 pages)
We win on two issues here: Harristhal doesn't get to add more witnesses in the middle of the hearing, and we're allowed to continue arguing co-conspirator jurisdiction. It's plaintiff's burden of proof to show a conspiracy, not our burden to disprove it. Since Harristhal brought up the conspiracy theory, he certainly can't deny us the right to argue against it.
25 April 2006: Motion to Vacate Default Judgement
cover letter to Harristhal
Defendant Ed Falk's Reply Brief in Support of Motion to Vacate Default Judgement (3 pages)
A default judgement was found against me during the period that Harristhal left my California lawyer out of the loop. Harristhal now argues that if I lose on jurisdiction, that the default judgement should be reinstated. We argue otherwise.
25 April 2006: Defendant David Ritz's Brief In Support Of Motion For Rule 56(f) Continuance An In Opposition To Plaintiff's Motion for Partial Summary Judgement (11 pages)
In a nutshell Ritz denies having done anything illegal and calls bullshit on a large number of Sierra's alleged "facts".
9 May 2006: Court Transcript, evidentiary hearing on jurisdiction, Sierra v Falk & Ritz.
23 May 2006: Closing arguments
Cover letter to court
Cover letter to Harristhal
Our Closing arguments (12 pages)
23 May 2006: Sierra's closing arguments
20 July 2006: Harristhal's letter to the court requesting that the default judgement against me be upheld despite the fact that we're still arguing jurisdiction
25 July 2006: Our response to the above
27 Oct 2006: We Won!: Court order dismissing on jurisdiction. (pdf, 7 pages)
22 Nov 2006: Sierra request for summary judgement against Ritz denied. (pdf, 4 pages)
Reynolds has asked the court for a summary judgment against David Ritz. The court roundly denied this request, pointing out that such judgments can only be made when there is no dispute about the facts of the case, and further pointing out that Reynolds' own expert witness, Brad Allison, had himself offered testimony that helped Ritz's case. My favorite part was the part on page 1 where Harristhal had actually objected to the use of his own expert witness's testimony for the purposes of the defense.
21 Dec 2006: Defendant's First Interrogatories to Sierra Corporate Design
21 Dec 2006: Defendants First Requests to Produce Documents to Sierra Corporate Design
Oct 2007: RIAA Lawsuit against Reynolds
Lesa Kraft avoids service (2 pages)
RIAA Complaint, part 1 (20 pages)
RIAA Complaint, part 2 (20 pages)