‘Copyright troll’ Liebowitz suspended by US federal court
Attorney Richard Liebowitz, who has gained notoriety as an alleged “copyright troll”, has been temporarily barred from practising at the US District Court for the Southern District District of New York.
The suspension order, issued on November 30, by the court’s Committee on Grievances followed a referral made by Judge Jesse Furman on June 26 in Usherson v Bandshell Artists (2020) which lambasted the attorney’s conduct.
Judge Furman held that Liebowitz had filed more cases in the southern district of New York than any other lawyer, which at last count was about 1,280, and that he had filed approximately the same number in other districts.
Since Liebowitz was called to the bar in 2015, he has filed more than 1,000 copyright infringement complaints on behalf of photographers and has been subject to a host of sanctions and disciplinary actions in multiple jurisdictions for filing spurious copyright claims.
“In that same period, he has earned another dubious distinction. He has become one of the most frequently sanctioned lawyers, if not the most frequently sanctioned lawyer, in the district,” said Furman in his referral to the committee.
He added that judges in the southern district of New York and elsewhere “had spent untold hours addressing Liebowitz's misconduct, which includes repeated violations of court orders and outright dishonesty, sometimes under oath”.
The opinion pointed out that in previous cases, Liebowitz had been denounced by various judges as “a copyright troll”, “a clear and present danger to the fair and efficient administration of justice”, and an “example of the worst kind of lawyering”.
In scores of cases, Liebowitz has been repeatedly chastised, warned, ordered to complete ethics courses, and fined, said Judge Furman.
In August, Judge Lawrence Kahn found that Liebowitz had used misleading citations in an attempt to recover an unjustifiable high hourly rate of attorney’s fees in Adlife Marketing & Communications v Buckingham Brothers (2020).
He called for Liebowitz’s removal from the roll of attorneys who can practise in the northern district of New York after fining him for inflating costs in a copyright lawsuit over a photograph.
“There is a strong public interest in shining a bright light on Liebowitz’s extraordinary record of misconduct and in ensuring that both courts and his clients, current and future, are aware of that history” so that they can be vigilant in scrutinising Liebowitz’s conduct,” he said.
The order issued this week stated that after careful deliberation, the committee was unanimously of the view that Furman’s charges were strongly supported by evidence.
“What is more, the committee is unanimously of the view that interim disciplinary measures against [the] respondent must be put in place immediately,” it said.
The committee also found that Liebowitz had shown repeated disregard for court orders and an unwillingness to change despite 19 formal sanctions and scores of other admonishments and warnings from judges across the country.
It proceeded to conclude that “in light of the nature and seriousness of the charges, the strength of the record supporting those charges, and the risk and danger of recurrence”, that Liebowitz’s interim suspension was warranted.
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