Lawsuit against FAIR

[Confidential Informant]

Well, if you were curious about the law suit and what was happening w/ it, both FAIR and Allen Wyatt filed motions w/ the court today. They are both on-line at

FAIR's is at http://www.fairlds.org/FAIRmotions.pdf

Wyatt's is at http://www.dcomp.com/DCImotions.pdf

Sorry, for some reason my http button isn't working.

Good reading if you've got the time and inclination.

C.I.

[Confidential Informant]

I'm surprised this hasn't gotten more attention. The motions are really quite interesting. An synopsis for the legally disinclined:

FAIR's attorney argues that FAIR should [not] even be a party to the suit. He's claiming that no one at FAIR authorized Wyatt or requested that Wyatt purchase the domain names. He also claims that FAIR executives didn't know anything about the Wyatt web site until many months after its publication. He states that FAIR has no control over the actions of others who might simply be members of FAIR (which makes sense since FAIR is an all-volunteer organzation). Thus, FAIR shouldn't be involved.

He also challenges the Tanners naming of Scott Gordon as an individual in the suit. He claims that the Tanners have provided no legal reason to be allowed to "pierce the corporate veil." (One of the reasons congress created corporations was to protect individual corportate officers from personal liability).

His argument is relatively short and to the point.

The Wyatt motion is much longer and very detailed. Wyatt argues about 5 different reasons why the suit sould be dismissed. His first argument is that Utah is an improper venue. Venue is a legal concept which can be difficult to understand so I won't go into here. The argument is pretty good though. The problem is that if Wyatt wins the venue issue, the suit is dismissed but is dismissed without prejudice, which means that if the Tanners are so inclined they can re-file in Arizona.

The second argument, and easily the most detailed and intricate one, is the claim that the court lacks "subject matter jurisdiction" because the Lanham Act applied only to web sites with a "commercial use" and since Wyatts site has no commercial use, it doesn't fall under the purview of the Lanham Act.

The third argument is that the court lacks "personal jurisdiction" which is another legal distinction. This argument is decent but, in most cases, very hard to win. I'll be curious to see how the judge rules on this issue.

The fourth argument is that the court lacks subject matter jurisdiction due to mootness. For a federal court to have jurisdiction, there must exist a "current case or controversy" at all times. Wyatt claims that since the Tanners file[d] suit he has offered to give them the domain names in question. They have, apparently, refused to take them, so Wyatt has transferred them into an escrow account and the account holder has been instructed to release them to no one but the Tanners or their legal rep. The most interesting part of this argument, however, is Wyatt's calculation of the damages.

The Tanners claim that Wyatt's site led to a big decrease in the sales of their books. But Wyatt shows that FAIR offers about 1600 items for sale in its book store. The Tanners offer about 300, but between the two sites, only about 30 items overlap. Of those 30 items, FAIR only sold about 34 of them over the two year period, and it appears that not a single one of those sales can be attributed to someone who entered the FAIR site by coming through the Wyatt site.

Another interesting aspect of the suit is the Web site numbers it quotes. Apparently, in a period of about 18 months, fewer than 150 people entered the FAIR site from the Wyatt sites.

I'll be curious to see what the Tanners make of this.

The final, and by far the most hilarious, motion for dismissal is the "Unclean Hands" claim. We've discussed this one on the thread prior. It appears that Sandra Tanner registed the domain name "bookofmormon.com." Unfortunatley for her, the term "Book of Mormon" is a registered trademark of Intellectual Reserve, which is the corporate entity created by the LDS Church as a repository for its intellectual properties. The Church operates two websites at www.thebookofmormon.com and www.bookofmormon.net which direct visitors to a site that gives away free B of M. However, Sandra has set it up so that if someone errs and types in www.bookofmormon.com they get redirected to her site.

Wyatt's attorney cites a case out of Vermont (I think) to support his argument that the Tanners are trying to stop Wyatt from engaging in the exact same sort of behavior that they are engaged in. That's called "unclean hands" and it can be fatal to the Tanners claim.

In all, a pretty complete filing which ought to have the Tanner's attorneys buring the midnight oil to respond.

C.I.

[urroner]

Hey, that "piercing the veil" and the "Knowledge is, indeed, power: it is not, without more however, domination." is good stuff.

[Blink]

I'm surprised this hasn't gotten more attention. The motions are really quite interesting. An synopsis for the legally disinclined . . .

Perhaps you meant to insert a "not" in your comment about the FAIR attorney's point?

To read: "FAIR's attorney argues that FAIR should [not] even be a party to the suit."

I agree. FAIR should not be a part of the suit. Neither should Scott Gordon. It puzzles me why they were included in the first place.

Dunamis has inserted some letters and words in square brackets to make the post easier to understand for upcoming readers.

[Scott Lloyd]

I'm surprised this hasn't gotten more attention.  The motions are really quite interesting.  An synopsis for the legally disinclined . . .

Seems pretty compelling from my admittedly uneducated vantage point.

The "unclean hands" concept, apart from its legal application, should quell some of the moralizing I have seen here. From a moral point of view, obviously the Tanners don't have any problem with it or they wouldn't be engaging in the same sort of behavior themselves.

[Confidential Informant]

I agree. FAIR should not be a part of the suit. Neither should Scott Gordon. It puzzles me why they were included in the first place.

You are correct, it was an omission.

As to FAIR, I guess it's up to the Tanners' attorneys now to explain their theory of why FAIR should be involved.

C.I.

[urroner]

I agree. FAIR should not be a part of the suit. Neither should Scott Gordon. It puzzles me why they were included in the first place.

You are correct, it was an omission.

As to FAIR, I guess it's up to the Tanners' attorneys now to explain their theory of why FAIR should be involved.

C.I.

McCarthyism and guilty by association.

[Benjamin McGuire]

The reason that FAIR was included in the first place was to establish a commercial connection. Obviously, anyone can link to a commercial website from a page without the consent of the site being linked to.

In order to try and argue that commercial gain was the objective, they needed to try and show that it was FAIR trying to redirect traffic to their own server as a way of getting revenue.

For Markk -

So, when the Tanner's redirect web users who attempt to go to www.bookofmormon.com to their own site - as a way of criticising the LDS faith, aren't they attempting to divert possible funds (i.e. future tithing dollars) from the LDS church - and shouldn't that be considered just as bad - if not more egregarious to the offense being discussed here? After all, I doubt very much that any of the domain names mentioned by the Tanner's suit are as well known as "BookofMormon" ...

So, Markk, should the LDS church pursue a similar course of action?

Ben

[Scott Lloyd]

The reason that FAIR was included in the first place was to establish a commercial connection. Obviously, anyone can link to a commercial website from a page without the consent of the site being linked to.

In order to try and argue that commercial gain was the objective, they needed to try and show that it was FAIR trying to redirect traffic to their own server as a way of getting revenue.

So I take it, then, that if FAIR succeeds in extricating itself from being a defendant, the whole case collapses.

Or am I reading it wrong?

[Confidential Informant]

The reason that FAIR was included in the first place was to establish a commercial connection. Obviously, anyone can link to a commercial website from a page without the consent of the site being linked to.

In order to try and argue that commercial gain was the objective, they needed to try and show that it was FAIR trying to redirect traffic to their own server as a way of getting revenue.

So I take it, then, that if FAIR succeeds in extraciting itself from being a defendant, the whole case collapses.

Or am I reading it wrong?

No, that's not quite true.

FAIR doesn't necessarily have to be a party for Wyatt's site to be declared to be "commercial."

The Peta case, cited in Wyatt's memorandum, reveals a case where the defendant has a non-commercial website but he also had something like 30 links to other sites that were expressly commercial, thus his site was considered by the court to be commercial also and none of the 30 sites he linked to were ever a part of the suit.

However, the Bosely court, which reviewed the Peta decision, was very very critical of the decision, and I think rightly so. It's simply way to broad and if you read it in that sense, then you could have some little woman in Iowa who runs a breast cancer survivor board that this expressly non-commercial but if she links to an artilce on WebMD, the Peta case would seem to indicate that she has transformed her site into a commercial site. I seriously doubt congress ever intended that to be the case.

Nevertheless, I think you are right. If FAIR goes away then I think the Tanners' suit suffers a major setback because, if I read their complaint correctly, FAIR served as the motive for Wyatt's site. In other words, Wyatt was trying to get FAIR to profit, but that doesn't appear to be much of a possibility. In short, it's possible the Tanners were simply looking for a perceived deep pocked to sue (if they only knew) and if they won they'd get the glee of shutting down a major source of criticism.

They could still proceed against Wyatt, but at that point they'll have to show how Wyatt benefitted commercially and that gets even dicier for them.

C.I.

[USU78]

FAIR's is at http://www.fairlds.org/FAIRmotions.pdf

That link is to an earlier version of FAIR's motion, if I am not mistaken.

[Moksha]

The Appeals Court in Denver will always be available to sort out the case on its merits, if these issues have been obscured by religious fervor or bias.

It is a shame Justice is so slow. I imagine FAIR wants to put this case behind it.

[Confidential Informant]

The Appeals Court in Denver will always be available to sort out the case on its merits, if these issues have been obscured by religious fervor or bias. 

Hello! Why are we in the appeals court already? What issues have been "obscured by religius fervor or bias" and who has made that claim?

I've read both motions, they both focus on the law and make little to no reference to any religious disputes. So what, exactly, are you getting at?

It is a shame Justice is so slow. I imagine FAIR wants to put this case behind it.

I imagine so. But the case was only filed what, a month and a half ago? Is that considered slow now?

C.I.

[SlackTime]

The Appeals Court in Denver will always be available to sort out the case on its merits, if these issues have been obscured by religious fervor or bias.

It is a shame Justice is so slow. I imagine FAIR wants to put this case behind it.

I don't know. If I was Scott Gordon I might actually get a smile or two out of this.

I don't see that this lawsuit has discomfited FAIR all that much

-Ed

[Dale]

Hi,

C.I. I am glad they were able to release the information so we could look through the materials. If the suit was filed a couple of months ago they might have two months to respond. So we might be looking at six months to get this resolved. Hopefully my estimate is to much & it won't take so long to get it resolved.

Some of the material would make a good FAIR article once this matters resolved.

Sincerely,

Dale

[Markk]

For Markk -

So, when the Tanner's redirect web users who attempt to go to www.bookofmormon.com to their own site - as a way of criticising the LDS faith, aren't they attempting to divert possible funds (i.e. future tithing dollars) from the LDS church - and shouldn't that be considered just as bad - if not more egregarious to the offense being discussed here? After all, I doubt very much that any of the domain names mentioned by the Tanner's suit are as well known as "BookofMormon" ...

So, Markk, should the LDS church pursue a similar course of action?

Ben

Hi Ben,

How you doing,

The Tanners have every right to use the BOM call name, they have spent much of their lives researching and studying the book. As far as I know the LDS church does not own the BOM any more so than they would own the Bible, if anyone owned the rights it would most likely be RLDS. UTLM whether you believe it or not is a great place to get other views of the BOM and Mormonism. Can I sue the LDS church for what I feel are wrong exegesis of the Bible? Of course not. The Tanners were born and rasied in the church and even though you don't like it they have as much right to the BOM as you do.

If I'm wrong here, and the LDS church has exclusive rights to the BOM, then I stand corrected and your point is well taken and the Tanners are wrong.

After reading Fair

[Markk]

Hi,

Last night I was surfing for more data on the law suite and did a google search on Wyatt and a hit came up that he had bought the rights to savegrantpalmer.com (Mormon curtain). If this is true, and I say If, I believe this would show a pattern that Wyatt has for buying URLS for whatever personal reasons. I'm not sure how to link this with the Tanner law suite, or if it has any bearing on the case, but I found it interesting.

So my question is before I go on, is it true Wyatt buys URLS to "protect" LDS interests and philosophies? I'm sure someone here could verify this. Also is there a site that tells you who is the registerd owners of URLS?

Thanks

Mark

John 1:12

[Scott Gordon]

Hi,

Last night I was surfing for more data on the law suite and did a google search on Wyatt and a hit came up that he had bought the rights to savegrantpalmer.com (Mormon curtain). If this is true, and I say If, I believe this would show a pattern that Wyatt has for buying URLS for whatever personal reasons. I'm not sure how to link this with the Tanner law suite, or if it has any bearing on the case, but I found it interesting.

So my question is before I go on, is it true Wyatt buys URLS to "protect" LDS interests and philosophies? I'm sure someone here could verify this. Also is there a site that tells you who is the registerd owners of URLS?

Thanks

Mark

John 1:12

This is true. And then he offered the URLs for free to the guy who wanted to use them.

Scott

[smac97]

> The Tanners have every right to use the BOM call name, they have spent much of their lives researching and studying the book.

==So if Wyatt has spent a lot of time researching and studying UTLM and the Tanners, does he have "every right" to use those names?

==Or do I sense a double standard coming on?

> UTLM whether you believe it or not is a great place to get other views of the BOM and Mormonism.

==And Wyatt's websites were/are great places to get other views on the Tanners. So that makes his domains okay, right?

==Or do I sense a double standard coming on?

> Answer me this, if what Wyatt did was OK, why did he give the names to the Tanners and shut down the links to his site?

==Oh, maybe it had something to do with not caring much about these domains, and not wanting to spend money litigating the thing.

-Smac

[Dale]

Hi,

I am reading the Tanners criticisms of Mormon history all of the time & they are just wrong. I can't read the Tanners mind but it looked to me the lawsuit was possibly done to stop people from being easily exposed to criticisms that made them look bad. It can no longer be said by them LDS are avoiding the issues. Nobody need be afraid of them anymore. When I see them answered point blank & they havn't spent five minutes on the FAIR website answers I find that amusing. Others have chosen them as experts which they have the right to do. Why are the Tanners afraid of defending themselves?

Of course my reading of the responses to their case may be decieving. Perhaps they can pull off a good counter response. But if they can't then they have a bad attorney & need somebody more qualified. It looks like they have an attorney who didn't know the law. The Tanners have the URL's they felt related to their ministries interests handed over to them. They should if they have a weak case do the decent thing & withdraw their claim before it get's thrown out of court. To me having their claim's rejected by a Judge would be much more damaging than a few old URL's. Sometimes people fight even when normal everyday common sense tells them fighting only postpones the eventual defeat. If their attorney has them continue on in a losing battle then he is victimizing them with bad judgement. The attorney's no doubt sincere, but you don't set up your bosses to lose.

Attorney's arn't cheap & I wonder how many starving children could have been fed based on money that they are paying their attorney to try & hurt FAIR's credibility. They could have accepted the handing over the URL's & ended the other non-sense. I wonder if they lose whether they will tell people the whole story about why they lost.

If anybody knows the Tanners try & advize them to do the right thing & give up. Being an angry victim won't help them make a bad case better.

Sincerely,

Dale

[Markk]

==So if Wyatt has spent a lot of time researching and studying UTLM and the Tanners, does he have "every right" to use those names?

==Or do I sense a double standard coming on?

No, it's not a double standard, not even the same argument. According to the BOM it was written by a guy named Mormon, that

[Markk]

Hi Dale,

I disagree about the Tanners, if a objective person want's to know the truth that is the first stop, FAIR, FARMS, and the others only preach to the choir and outside of Mormonism are not taken seriously by anyone.

Take a book like Shadow of reality, how much of it would you say is "wrong", I would love to start on page one and go through it with you via e-mail if your game, I'll even buy you a copy if you don't have one.

I do agree with you that the Tanners are victims though and should let it go, even if they can win, like I said before there is no winners.

Take care Dale, my offer is on the table, it might take 20 years, but what the heck.

Mark

John 1:12

[Dale]

Hi,

Mark the Tanners throw everything at people in an attempt to overwhelm people. I will let the FAIR folks rebut the Tanners I have run out of patience reading their message. I believe debating Mormonism is a waste of time anymore. Mark Cares of the Speaking The Truth In Love To Mormons book advocated teaching his Gospel rather than debating things like Joseph's character, or whatever. He has a website & I have met him. He's a nice guy & decent critic of the LDS Church.

The real issue is did Martin Luther reform the church, or start another type of apostasy? I don;t believe Martin Luther. I don't believe in his ideas of the Gospel. The book entitled Will The Real Heretics Please Stand Up by David Bercot shows errors of his grace alone gospel. Read the book & then tell me where it is wrong? www.scrollpublishing.com

Another book showing the errors of the Tanner is On Behalf of Christ Restored Gospel available throught the book store at http://www.angelmessage.org/care

But even if the First Vision had enough problems to be rejected it doesn't matter unless the Gospel being offered is the True Gospel. Trivia is just trivia unless the Gospel is the real one. Being over bearing & rigid in anti-Restoration conclusion isn't defending the faith if it's man-made ideology & not real Christianity.

Certainly I stand up for the right of the Tanners to sue FAIR. Although it's no been established that they have a case. The URL Problem has been resolved which the Tanners should be happy with.

To avoid getting the thread off Topic I will start a thread on the Tanner book where we can move this discussion to. Errors of Mormonism Shadow or Reality? Exposed

Sincerely,

Dale

[1dc]

The problem is he used their personal names to help his motives to have some sort of reality.

If someone told you anyone has a right to a URL with their name is a bit short of a full loaf. URLs are sold on a first come basis and if you want your name on the WWW you must pay for that privilege for most if not all of the domain services.

Further, one's name is seldom their "personal" name. Most names (mine included) can or likely will have another person bear the same name. Just hope your great grandkids raise your namesake uprightly.

Since you seem to want a guess . . mine would be that Wyatt didn't want to spend more money on lawyers since his purpose was not ecomonic gain. That it wasn't fought and used for his personal gain would add a lot more credibility to his argument IMO. The Tanners could just as easily ignored him and obviously chose not to . . for whatever reasons they were willing to spend money while he was not.

[Confidential Informant]

No, it's not a double standard, not even the same argument.

What is becoming clear is that you don't really understand the argument being made, despite your claim to have read the Complaint and Wyatt's response.

The argument has nothing to do with the whole Book of Mormon, (though it's my understanding that that 1980 version is still under copyright). The argument has to do with the three word term, "Book of Mormon", a term which is trademarked, not copyrighted -- they are two related but different concepts -- and trademark is owned by the LDS Church.

Thus, the Tanners have taken a trademark, registered and owned by someone else, and are using it in a confusing manner to attract visitors to their own site. In other words, they are engaged in and, in essence, violating the same laws they claim Wyatt and FAIR are violating.

Since you and your oversensative moral compass are such great fans of the Tanners, I would suggest you email, or ever better, give Sandra and call and tell her that you think she should drop the suit.

According to the BOM it was written by a guy named Mormon, that