Is the lesson here that pro se lawsuits are actually way more viable the people originally thought since courts will bend over backwards to reinterpret their legal screed? Or is the lesson that suing sites and people with a bad reputation is easier than people originally thought since courts will bend over backwards to rule against the "bad bad people"? I'm probably at a 60/40 mix where "pro se is more viable" is the 60 right now. Pro se is way more viable than I thought, but obviously KF and its reputation are making it even easier for the court to rule for Greer.
Here is what you need to understand about
pro se civil suits.
- Anyone can file them, including non-citizens and non-residents.
- They can be filed anywhere by anyone.
- They can assert any allegation and it will be presumed true until discovery.
- You do not need to be an attorney to file, and there is no auditing to verify you are who you say you are.
- A defendant does need an attorney to represent an LLC, so if you file pro se as a person against a one member LLC, they must hire presentation.
- Attorneys are limited by state. If you file in the wrong state, that's a benefit to you, because they have to put down a second $5000 retainer to even move the case. There's probably less than a dozen attorneys who would sit on the bar of both, for instance, Hawaii and Kansas.
- If they do not participate, they lose by default. This includes instances where you've sued them in a jurisdiction they've never been in.
There are a few sniff tests that filter out the most basic and primitive spurious lawsuits
sua sponte, however, they can be easily met in writing alone.
- They must state a claim. It doesn't matter what it is, but you must reference a statute or common law tort by which you seek relief.
- They must justify jurisdiction and venue. It doesn't have to be a good justification, they just have to try.
Remember, in the initial filings, every single thing the plaintiff says is assumed to be true. You are guilty until proven innocent. You do not have a right to a speedy trial. You do not have a right to an attorney. You can only represent yourself, not your company.
So lets see how this plays out in practice. An insane woman in Virginia files against a Floridian company and person in Virginia. She claims relief under an IIED tort (one of the worst in modern law to actually win, but a real tort) and claims that the venue is correct because she lives there and the Internet has unfortunately reached western Virginia. Therefore, she passes the smell test (legally speaking, not in real life). Then, a timer starts. You either pay a Virginia attorney or you lose and owe a billion trillion dollars to an insane person.
My theory is that this works for anyone. Lets say a Bulgarian crimelord and someone (you) pisses him off who lives in Kansas. He (henceforth "Ivan") can probably sue you and your company in Hawaii alleging that his name is Chubudu Holo'dowannatingo and he were super-mega-raped by this person living in Kansas, during your vacation to Hawaii. Ivan claims IIED and False Imprisonment (torts under which to seek relief). He claims, specifically, that he was victimized during April 2020 in Honolulu.
He pays someone $20 in bitcoin to print this filing (generated for free in 30 seconds by a local LLM) and sends it to the court house. They docket it. He then pays someone else $20 in bitcoin to service you in Kansas. You have a family friend who's an attorney, and you pay him $5000 for a retainer, but unfortunately, he's only on the Kansas bar, not the Hawaii bar.
You have a really good defense: you were in jail in Leavenworth for war crimes in 2020, and also COVID lockdowns didn't permit flights to Hawaii. Also, Holo'dowannatingo doesn't exist and there's no record she exists.
So you pay $5000 for a retainer for a Hawaiian attorney. He manages to argue venue is inappropriate because it's a bullshit case, and it's transferred to Kansas (you get no money out of your retainer). The case is transferred to Kansas, and the local news prints about your rape case which gets spread on Facebook. You eventually win but you don't have the money to harass local news for retractions.
In that year, you spent 1/4th of your gross income on attorney's fees, spent 6 months highly anxious awaiting results, lost friends because you were falsely accused, and in the end all the court can do is shrug because Ivan lives in Bulgaria and the case was filed anonymous on behalf of a fictitious entity. Your life is ruined and nobody cares.
