Righthaven’s lawyers now targets of State Bar investigation

Las Vegas-based copyright enforcer Righthaven has been losing in court for months, even as opposing lawyers go after its bank accounts, computers, and office chairs. Righthaven lost its own domain name, which was auctioned off last week for $3,300 in order to pay the court judgment against the company. Righthaven even had to submit to a “debtor's exam” on Monday in which opposition lawyers got to go through the company's books and grill company leaders over where all the cash went. Surely, the indignities can't get much worse. Or can they?

Steve Green, a Las Vegas reporter who has covered the entire Righthaven saga in excruciating detail, now notes that three of the company's lawyers, including CEO Steve Gibson, are the subject of a Nevada State Bar investigation. Details of the inquiry aren't public, but judges have been blasting Righthaven's legal team so strongly in court that the move is hardly a surprise.

(One federal judge ruled that "there is a significant amount of evidence that Righthaven made intentional misrepresentations to the Court" and that "this conduct demonstrated Righthaven's bad faith," for instance.)

How far we've come since Righthaven launched with the backing of the Las Vegas Review-Journal, whose publisher warned in print, "I'm asking you nicely once again—don't steal our content. Or, I promise you, you will meet my little friend called Righthaven." One of his columnists frothed that even those targeted by Righthaven were getting off easy, saying, "I hate [thieves] with a passion. Lawsuits? They should have their godd**ned hands cut off and nailed to the wall of City Hall."

Despite that initial vigilante bravado, Righthaven has turned into the butt of a joke. After suing an Ars Technica writer without cause, losing multiple times on "fair use" claims, having its bank accounts seized and its domain name auctioned off, Righthaven is no longer in any position to wreak havoc. Indeed, judges have ruled that the Righthaven lawyers didn't actually manage to control the copyrights upon which they are suing.

By the time it's all over, the lawyers who set out to stop "thieves" and save the newspaper business could find themselves sanctioned—or worse. What is it about the lawyers behind mass copyright lawsuits that makes them so eminently sanctionable by State Bars and federal judges?