Most of Melinda's nutcase lawsuits were dismissed effectively by judges that did their job without needing to force the defendant to spend thousands of dollars. Then the last one didn't and it sucks that the only party in this that faces actual monetary losses is the one that was clearly correct.
Options that could avoid this in civil cases:
1) Per se plaintiffs must submit property or bond sufficient to cover the initial phase of a lawsuit
2) Those who cannot do 1, including but not limited to those filing IFP must submit their case for actual review by a judicial authority to determine that
each claim passes the lowest bar possible. Russell Greer should not have been able to file his ridiculous lawsuit unless it was pruned of everything but the copyright claim. Melinda should be laughed out of every court she tries to step into.
3) Claims such as initial certification of service should also face basic review. The "trust me" system doesn't work if there's little or no recourse for lying or being wrong as there is for lawyers.
4) If plaintiff passes 2 and 3 but the claims are thrown out (failure to state a claim, etc) because the judicial reviewer didn't do his job, the court covers reasonable attorney's costs for the defendant and can then try to recover those costs from the plaintiff using all methods at its disposal.
This would place more labor on the court but might get it to actually do something so that individuals can't be sued into the ground by insane people. I don't hold out much hope for changes, though. Not many people face this problem because the typical targets for frivolous lawsuits are wealthy people- like Taylor Swift- who can squash them like a bug without worrying about the costs.
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