William James Mitchell vs. Twin Galaxies LLC, Jeff Harrist & Jeremy Young & donkeykongforum.com, Benjamin Q Smith

[HarmanSmith69]

Something deep down in them

That would be autism/aspergers. They need to be precise and "fair" with everything no matter how inconsquential.

 

[MeltyTW]

Also, is the cheating accusation really THAT big of a deal in the first place? Outside unearned bragging rights, did Billy's cheating result in him earning any material/monetary prizes?

Billy is a bitch who uses the legal system to silence and compel speech to say he's good at a children's video game. Redditors and jobst iirc though believe in hate speech laws and don't even care that all Billy got was the guiness record back and twingalaxies including his record in a previous versions archives with asterisks on it.

They care alot more because it's them being power tripped on with the institutionally backed compelled speech and humiliation rituals instead of the chuds for once.

 

[AnOminous]

This reminds me of Twin Galaxies' lawyer getting emotionally involved in wanting to destroy Billy too. So, he started harassing Billy's witnesses and killed a slam dunk case. Maybe Mitchell Derangement Syndrome is an actual thing.

That's Billy's superpower, apparently. He's so utterly hateable that he gets his enemies to go full retard.

 

[American Castration]

That would be autism/aspergers. They need to be precise and "fair" with everything no matter how inconsquential.

I have neighbors like this. Their homes are filthy, disgusting hovels. They smoke weed 24/7, and don't gaf that it stinks up the homes of all the families around them. Spergs and autists don't have any regard for order and are the least obsessive-compulsive people on Earth. This is legitimately what their homes look like:

Their rage at Billy Mitchell or Trump or whoever else is not because of "fairness", "justice", "democracy", etc. That's just cover for their vanity. They hate them because they know they're inferior in every way, but if they can convince everybody that they're morally superior to the Russian Asset Trump or the Evil Emulator User Billy Mitchell, then that will make them superior.

 

[Philier]

There is a claim by Ersatz_Cats (owner of PerfectPacman.com) that Karl's lawyer fucked up the case, which excluded a legit defense, in particular he claims that Karl could not bring in evidence why he believed what he said to be true at the time.

I think this is particularly interesting because if good-faith evidence exists for Karl to have believed the accusations to be true at the time of making them and re-uploading the video, making the statements for a second time, then that could have changed the outcome of the case considerably. I wish we had some Australian law experts here on KF who could explain if this could be true and what the legal consequences would be. Obviously Karl cannot appeal this and use a new defense, even the Australian cannot be retarded enough to allow that, right?

I haven't seen Ersatz video, but the judge specifically cited the fact that Billy, His lawyers and other people told Karl that Billy had nothing to do with the suicide and that he had never recived money from Apollo and despite of this his video accusing Billy of the suicide remained on his channel for months. When he finally took it down and "apologized", his apology didn't really exonerated Billy from the suicide accusation. At no point Karl straight up did something as simple as "Guys, I said Billy was the cause of the suicide, I was wrong and I apologize for this". Had he done that he'd still own his house. But because he blatantly had a massive hate boner for Billy, something the judge brought up, he's going to end up homeless and, lets face it, divorced. Asian wifes are not big into "it's ok we are poor because we love each other" kind of shit.

The judge specifically called this out and seemed bewildered at this choice of defense.

I listened to this expecting a loljudge delivering a lolstralian joke of an opinion but it was actually well reasoned and included a lot of facts Karl had hidden for years.

It should have been a dead giveaway when this jackass was providing no actual dox. It's another fucking Rekieta type lesson, just because you hate the guy someone's attacking doesn't mean the other guy isn't a complete asshole himself.

Judge basically said "I dont give a fuck if he cheats at video games"

 

[American Castration]

That's Billy's superpower, apparently. He's so utterly hateable that he gets his enemies to go full retard.

Nobody "hates" Billy Mitchell besides Redditors. Literally nobody.

Why do you hate him?

 

[twodogsinacoat]

That would be autism/aspergers. They need to be precise and "fair" with everything no matter how inconsquential.

It is ironic that this very same train of thought is what often leads to all the cheating and stupidness in the first place. People that feel they “need” the records or that it isn’t fair they worked so hard without getting them. As with most people they’ll quickly flip over their convictions once it benefits them.

This whole situation is nothing but ego.

 

[Gobermental Supervisor]

I have neighbors like this. Their homes are filthy, disgusting hovels. They smoke weed 24/7, and don't gaf that it stinks up the homes of all the families around them. Spergs and autists don't have any regard for order and are the least obsessive-compulsive people on Earth. This is legitimately what their homes look like:

Wow, how did you get a still from the Nick Rekieta bodycam footage?
Absolutely disgusting.

I haven't seen Ersatz video, but the judge specifically cited the fact that Billy, His lawyers and other people told Karl that Billy had nothing to do with the suicide and that he had never recived money from Apollo and despite of this his video accusing Billy of the suicide remained on his channel for months. When he finally took it down and "apologized", his apology didn't really exonerated Billy from the suicide accusation. At no point Karl straight up did something as simple as "Guys, I said Billy was the cause of the suicide, I was wrong and I apologize for this". Had he done that he'd still own his house. But because he blatantly had a massive hate boner for Billy, something the judge brought up, he's going to end up homeless and, lets face it, divorced. Asian wifes are not big into "it's ok we are poor because we love each other" kind of shit.

Yes, I have read the ruling and the Judge completely obliterates Karl and is specifically upset about the way he talked about Billy and aggravated the reputational harm further.
Ersatz_Cats did not make a video, he writes a blog on his website and he traveled to Australia to makes notes during the trial and update the public with his observations.

As far as I understand it the claim is that Karl's lawyer forgot to plead correctly ahead of the trial so Karl could defend himself on the basis of "I believed it to be true at the time because of X". This is my rudimentary layman's understanding of the Australian court system. If that were true I would very much like to know about it, because if Karl had a good faith basis to believe his statements to be true and he was unable to argue it because his lawyer fucked it up, it would be pretty bad and hilarious at the same time.

 

[AnOminous]

holy shit lol....

Imagine taking PUA advice from this albino fuck so weak the sun literally gives him cancer like he was Nosferatu (and who married a brickfaced ricewife).

 

[Ygolonac]

Karl's defense instead seemed to be "I can't slander Billy because that cheater has no reputation I can lie about that asshole all I want" you want why the judge thinks Karl is full of malice for Billy.

"It was reasonable to believe at the time" is the right move, but would be hard to go with considering Karl's behaviour and lack of effort to correct the mistake or apologize for it. Even then was it reasonable for Karl to believe? He probably read the note or had some degree of understanding or insider information. He was involved with the community at the time and associated with people who were directly involved. He presents himself as an investigative journalist, He's not some random guy with no context who read a Reddit comment.

I don't believe the slander really damaged Billy much, but I can easily see the judges perspective that Karl is a remorseless individual who is likely to reoffend and should be punished as a deterrence.

 

[Gobermental Supervisor]

I don't believe the slander really damaged Billy much

I agree with you on all points except this one.
I was also shocked by the ruling, until I read the full thing and formed my own opinion based on what the judge wrote and comparing it to what I knew from Karl's videos.

I actually believed Karl had a case, because I expected it to be about more than just Apollo Legend and for him to have a basis for his statements. Until I ready the ruling I still believed that the statements about Apollo Legend were reasonable, even after the judge ruled in favor of Billy because I needed some time to process it and read the full reasoning.
Which is exactly the kind of proof that Billy's reputation was harmed by this. Me, some random internet user, believed the defamatory statements to be true.

So I think Karl did extra harm to Billy's reputation, even if I still think Billy is a litigious asshole, he isn't a murderer.

 

[zzzten]

There is a claim by Ersatz_Cats (owner of PerfectPacman.com) that Karl's lawyer fucked up the case, which excluded a legit defense, in particular he claims that Karl could not bring in evidence why he believed what he said to be true at the time.

I think this is particularly interesting because if good-faith evidence exists for Karl to have believed the accusations to be true at the time of making them and re-uploading the video, making the statements for a second time, then that could have changed the outcome of the case considerably. I wish we had some Australian law experts here on KF who could explain if this could be true and what the legal consequences would be. Obviously Karl cannot appeal this and use a new defense, even the Australian cannot be retarded enough to allow that, right?

The judge also accepted billy mitchell as a credible witness.
Billy has already been caught forging awards, scores, and even his own history.
Given his documented history of deception, it wouldn't surprise me if the documents that billy handed over about lost business was also completely forged.

This just goes to show that jobst didn't take the case serious enough. I think the main reason for the judge ruling in billy's favour was karl not shutting the fuck up in his videos about how much he hated billy. This is what really stood out.

 

[AnOminous]

I wish we had some Australian law experts here on KF who could explain if this could be true and what the legal consequences would be.

I know a lot more about UK law since our own common law system derives heavily from theirs, while Australia went down a different branch, so I don't really have a strong opinion on the technical details of this.

However, I could see a U.S. court making essentially the same decision based on this set of facts. Let's assume for the moment Karl actually sincerely believed his original accusation to be true (I still believe this to be the case). That would have shielded him under the "actual malice" standard here, since Mitchell is at least a limited public figure and his lolsuit against Apollo Legend was a matter of public interest he intentionally involved himself in.

I'll note the Australian judge cited "malice," but I'll note this doesn't mean what it does here. It literally means what it means in normal English. Our "actual malice" doesn't require actual malice, nor does actual malice (in its plain language sense) qualify as "actual malice." It is merely knowledge of falsity or reckless disregard for truth or falsity (which requires a subjective element of actual doubt).

So it's very hard to defeat a claim of sincere belief, unless the person admitted he knew it was false. Almost nobody is going to say "hell yeah I was lying and I loved it!" And the distinction between actual malice and "actual malice" is typified by Larry Flynt openly stating on the stand that he didn't merely wish to defame Jerry Falwell's character, but to "assassinate" it. (The parodic cartoon was incidentally literally labeled as satirical and was clearly not a statement of fact.)

In any event, the fact Jobst was obviously incredibly hostile to Mitchell and was acting according to that met the malice standard. (I'll note a section of the ruling is partially entitled "reckless disregard" because the common law regarding malice in defamation cases in both the U.S. and .au was inherited from UK law using the same language, but the actual standards are deeply different.)

The difference is that "malice" in Australia defeats certain defenses like "fair comment" or even, sometimes, actual truth, one of many fundamental differences between our common law and that of Commonwealth countries.

However, we're all on the same page on the specific issue of intentionally uttering falsehoods to harm someone. I've noted, and am taking as true for the purposes of argument, that Karl actually did initially believe that his accusations were true.

However, knowledge of falsity, since it can almost never be proven directly (nobody yells "ha ha I LIED" while cackling like a villain), usually relies on inference from the actions of the party. In this case, Jobst received information clearly showing his claims were false. Instead of acknowledging this, he concealed it.

To add insult to injury, he issued a "retraction" in an all but hidden video, instead of to the same audience he had made the defamatory statements. Think of it like when a tabloid issues a defamatory statement on its front page with a giant picture of a celebrity, then "retracts" it months later on page 12.

The inference is he actually knew it was false, but wanted it to remain out there anyway, out of malice.

However, this meets not just the Australian but the American definition of "malice." He actually knew or harbored doubts as to the truth of his statements.

The only other thing I can say distinctly differs from U.S. law is the use of "general damages" in defamation. These are damages separate from economic damages (the judge opens the part of the decision relating to damages by discussing this). Under the Defamation Act in Australia, the court has the discretion to order general damages (distinct from economic damages) up to 478,500 AUD. You'll note he ordered general damages pretty high in the range.

(And to add to the fun, we have "general damages" here too, and they're pretty similar in consisting of things like "pain and suffering" and "shame" but you'd often need to bring in expert witnesses like psychiatrists to prove them.)

However, courts here are fairly trigger-happy on the punitive damages part, which is where Jobst got off easy here (partly because Mitchell barely asked for any at all and got all he asked for and the judge explicitly noted if he had asked for more he would have gotten it). So I could easily see a court coming to a smaller compensatory damages award here but slapping Jobst with a huge punitive damages award just for wasting everyone's time.

tl;dr when I heard about this ruling I was hoping for something I could jump up and down and yell "lolstarlia teh big dumb dumb country" about but instead it appears the judge is right, and Jobst might have met the same downfall even in the most libel-hostile country in the world, the U.S.

 

[Ygolonac]

I agree with you on all points except this one.
I was also shocked by the ruling, until I read the full thing and formed my own opinion based on what the judge wrote and comparing it to what I knew from Karl's videos.

I actually believed Karl had a case, because I expected it to be about more than just Apollo Legend and for him to have a basis for his statements. Until I ready the ruling I still believed that the statements about Apollo Legend were reasonable, even after the judge ruled in favor of Billy because I needed some time to process it and read the full reasoning.
Which is exactly the kind of proof that Billy's reputation was harmed by this. Me, some random internet user, believed the defamatory statements to be true.

So I think Karl did extra harm to Billy's reputation, even if I still think Billy is a litigious asshole, he isn't a murderer.

I mean restitution for defamation is determined by the monetary harm the claims caused to the plaintiff, and Billy's case in this regard was weak. Even the severity of the emotional distress it caused him is dubious.

Billy should have got a diagnosis of anxiety or depression or something from the suicide accusations and harrassment rendering him unable to work, including at his restaurant. because convention cancellations are going to be overwhelmingly if not purely due to his cheating accusations, but he got his bag anyway in Kangaroo court.

 

[Spooky Dogwood]

Asian wifes are not big into "it's ok we are poor because we love each other" kind of shit.

lets be real here: It's one thing if you're a working class guy that just got into a bit of a rough patch, but It's unreasonable to expect a woman to stay with you when you're saddled with debt and have no way to financially recover after your youtube career starts to flounder. There is a transactional aspect to relationships, and now perhaps being married to Karl means being shackled to financial destitution. Most women aren't going to wallow in the gutter if they don't have to. Unless Karl has more money saved up than people are speculating, he can only hope she has no other option.

 

[Sinner's Sandwich]

If his wife divorces him and takes the kid, Karl is going to lose his mind and troon out.

 

[AnOminous]

Given his documented history of deception, it wouldn't surprise me if the documents that billy handed over about lost business was also completely forged.

If I had to speculate, I'd bet he threatened to sue them unless they provided him some statement it was about the Apollo Legend shit (and not that they found out he was the fake "King of Kong").

lets be real here: It's one thing if you're a working class guy that just got into a bit of a rough patch, but It's unreasonable to expect a woman to stay with you when you're saddled with debt and have no way to financially recover after your youtube career starts to flounder.

ESPECIALLY if you're saddled with debt because you took an autistic grudge about vidya WAY too far.

I mean restitution for defamation is determined by the monetary harm the claims caused to the plaintiff, and Billy's case in this regard was weak. Even the severity of the emotional distress it caused him is dubious.

Most of the damages were "general" i.e. non-economic damages like pain and suffering. I find them dodgy but whatever.

 

[GamerGateSurvivor]

This just goes to show that jobst didn't take the case serious enough

That's an understatement. The Kino Casino (say what you want to about them, you're probably right) went over his old videos last night and it seemed like he went out of his way to do everything wrong. He outright announced that his legal strategy was to claim Billy was defamation-proof despite the fact that nobody outside of your most hardcore gamer (and us) knows who he is and all the accusations of him cheating to achieve his high scores. There's a reason why attorneys tell you not to talk about your case which, IIRC, is one of the reasons why Akilah Hughes lost her case against Carl Benjamin.

Plus Jobst forgot something very important. Video games aren't the most important thing in life and they're not worth waging jihads over.

 

[Wodanaz]

Ersatz_Cat is also still coping over there on PerfectPacman (Archive) that people are retarded for not understanding what the lawsuit was about

Billy was never defamed in any legally meaningful sense. I know this because I'm not a lawyer, a judge, or even a citizen of the country where this case is being adjudicated.
I know this because random people commenting on my own article are randomly accusing Billy of being an evil bastard who manipulates people into suicide.

What a fucking clown, lol.

 

[Gobermental Supervisor]

I mean restitution for defamation is determined by the monetary harm the claims caused to the plaintiff

No.

The judge awarded the damages for more than one action of defamation. Karl repeated the claim, so the amount is increased.
If he had only said it once maybe he would only ow Billy half?

(Source: Ruling)

The majority of money awarded is for general damages, which is NOT economic damages. Those fall under aggravated damages, for which Billy was "only" awarded 50000$AU.
So the primary harm Karl did to Billy was emotional and reputational. Which I agree with given what we now understand to be true.

(Source: Ruling)
(Source: Ruling)

(Source: #35 of the Defamation Act)
(Source: Ruling)

So the 50000$AU are for the economic loss and everything else is for Billy's hurt feelings and as a sign to the public to show that he has been vindicated.

[EDIT] Karl is actually lucky that Billy did not ask for more in aggravated damages and the judge stuck to the asked amount. He seems to have been inclined to reward more.

[EDIT2] Added the ruling as an attachment for those interested.