Man Posts Laws Online: State of Georgia Sues - Calls Man A Terrorist

Before I even begin... Yes, I was an Eagle Scout. I do know what flying the US Flag upside down means. It is a distress signal, and it applies here.

Hello again ATS,

From the realms of both "God my own state embarrasses me" and "This is real???" comes the most recent travail of a man named Carl Malamud. Mr Malamud is something of a minor activist... He runs a website that hosts scans of US Government legal documents so that they are easily accessible to the citizens of the United States as well as individual States.

For his troubles the State of Georgia has called Mr Malamud a terrorist and is suing him for copyright violation.

The loophole that Georgia is using to initiate this lawsuit is laughable at best. Their position? The laws themselves might be public domain... but the legal annotations to those laws are not. For $378.00 you can pay Lexus Nexus for access to the annotations - but otherwise you are stuck hiring an attorney to get the benefit of knowing exactly how a Judge is going to approach any given interpretation of a statute.

It bears mentioning that the legal annotations are heavily considered in the Court's interpretation of a law. In fact case law and annotations are exactly the tools that Judges use to interpret and administer a law.

While the copyright claim is arguable, though obnoxious and laughable, the allusions to terrorism are not. In fact the allusions to terrorism are blatantly frightening. Since when does knowing the law constitute "terrorism"? How is this different from the days when the Catholic Church ruled and owning or reading a Bible, outside of the Clergy, was considered a Capital offense?

When seeking to inform others of the law gets one labelled a terrorist - I offer that the real terrorists might be the ones in power and not those trying to openly discuss their government.

What are your thoughts on this ATS? Do you agree or disagree with Georgia or Mr Malamud?

Thanks for reading.

A HUGE thank you to ATS member notmyrealname for finding a link to the lawsuit. Case 1:15-cv-02594-MHC]Link to lawsuit.

Story on Rawstory

Hopefully no one agrees with this terrorism label...

But fair play to him, he could set an SC precedent to making annotations publicly available without a price...

Because let's be honest, if you're charged a fee to know the law...
That's a smoking gun that this is a rigged game.

a reply to: Hefficide
I haven't read the Rawstory link yet however, if they are suing this man due to unlawful disclosure of private documentation, (i.e. Annexes purchased on Lexus Nexus) wouldn't that be a matter between Lexus Nexus and Carl Malmud?

a reply to: notmyrealname

One would assume. The irony and funny footnote here... I am currently digging everywhere trying to find the actual lawsuit itself and keep finding myself behind a...

Pay wall.

a reply to: Hefficide

It's a slippery slope when something is labeled as a terrorist act. Where does it end? I think that calling him a terrorist for making sure that others know the laws is ridiculous. I hope the suit gets thrown out.

a reply to: Hefficide
I have had a sip of coffee and want to dig in here a bit. for the sake of brainstorming, I will pose some questions as well as some supposed answers and if this triggers anything with ATS, please let your ideas flow:

1. Was the person/people that wrote the annotations, employed by the state?
If so the copyright would be invalid in itself as it would have been funded by the public.

Ah, however I found some more stuff to help understand this matter:

Here is how the complaint—filed in US District Court in Atlanta last week—begins:

This action for injunctive relief arises from Defendant’s systematic, widespread, and unauthorized copying and distribution of the copyrighted annotations in the Official Code of Georgia Annotated (“O.C.G.A.”) through the distribution of thumb drives containing copies of the O.C.G.A. and the posting of the O.C.G.A. on various websites. Defendant has facilitated, enabled, encouraged, and induced others to view, download, print, copy, and distribute the O.C.G.A copyrighted annotations without limitation, authorization, or appropriate compensation. On information and belief, Defendant has also created unauthorized derivative works containing the O.C.G.A. annotations by re-keying the O.C.G.A. in order to make it possible for members of the public to copy and manipulate the O.C.G.A., thereby also encouraging the creation of further unauthorized derivative works.

The copyrighted annotations include analysis and guidance that are added to the O.C.G.A. by a third party publisher of the O.C.G.A. as a work for hire. These annotations include synopses of cases that interpret the O.C.G.A., summaries of Opinions of the Attorney General of Georgia, and summaries of research references related to the O.C.G.A. Each of these annotations is an original and creative work of authorship that is protected by copyrights owned by the State of Georgia. Without providing the publisher with the ability to recoup its costs for the development of these copyrighted annotations, the State of Georgia will be required to either stop publishing the annotations altogether or pay for development of the annotations using state tax dollars. Unless Defendant’s infringing activities are enjoined, Plaintiff and citizens of the State of Georgia, will face losing valuable analysis and guidance regarding their state laws.

Source

So again, I ask, If the work was commissioned using public money, can or should this be copyrightable? If so, shouldn't the State get a sovereign waiver of some sort as this material directly applies to the interpretation of the law applied to the public at large?

The only terror I see being used, Is by the state of Georgia. To terrorize this man. Although I dont know the facts, on this story, It seems pretty obvious what is going on here. Ordinary citizens aren't supposed to understand law "Sarcasim", and it scares the crap out of the people in elected positions to the state of Georgia.

originally posted by: Hefficide
a reply to: notmyrealname

One would assume. The irony and funny footnote here... I am currently digging everywhere trying to find the actual lawsuit itself and keep finding myself behind a...

Pay wall.

Here is the lawsuit:
Case 1:15-cv-02594-MHC

a reply to: notmyrealname

Thank you for that! I'll add it to the OP and credit you!

a reply to: Hefficide

Actually it looks as though a third party has the copyright on the annotated codes that he published not the state.

The state is not asserting that it is a copyright violation to publish the text of the statutes themselves, “since the laws of Georgia are and should be free to the public.” However, Public.Resource.Org has no right to republish the annotated version of Georgia’s code, which is created by a third-party legal publisher as a work for hire under contract with the state legislature, alleges the complaint (PDF). It was filed Tuesday in federal district court in Atlanta.

www.abajournal.com...

You can read the complaint here, and it says nothing about terrorism or him being prosecuted for it.

ia801504.us.archive.org...

This is why we need all this information on the BLOCKCHAIN, once it's up, it's NEVER coming down!

And I don't know about you, but I'd want our laws to be public domain for free forever.

Technology is our answer, how we use it is our weapon of choice, fight fire with fire.

Freedom of information act should play a part here somewhere, if it's public knowledge of how a judge acts, it should be in the public domain as to the laws this judge would react too.

originally posted by: Hefficide
a reply to: notmyrealname

Thank you for that! I'll add it to the OP and credit you!

Can I use the credit for more coffee?

a reply to: tsurfer2000h

Carl Malamud, has indicated that this type of strategy has been a successful form of “terrorism” that he has employed in the past to force government entities to publish documents on Malamud’s terms

From the following linked source T echdirt

a reply to: Hefficide

Carl Malamud, has indicated that this type of strategy has been a successful form of “terrorism” that he has employed in the past to force government entities to publish documents on Malamud’s terms

So that's his claim not the states as it seems to be what the OP is presenting.

As it shows in the link of the whole complaint it never once mentions terrorism and it being related to this case.

So in fact he isn't being called a terrorist and this suite has nothing to do with the state calling him a terrorist, it doesn't really matter what some article says the complaint is the real evidence that shows the truth.

He isn't being called a terrorist by the state of GA.

a reply to: Hefficide

I am not stateside but that sound's like a clear breach of your freedom of information law's, to place a surcharge or a charge on accessing them or make that material into a product is therefore a method of inhibiting the access to that information and therefore in contravention of your freedom of information right's as the information should also be freely available upon request with a minimum administration charge only, i.e. the cost of the paper and the time spent collating the information which I would assume has been done a long time ago.

So is this a case of your state law going against your federal law and does this man have ground's to sue back for a clear case of slander and harassment.

a reply to: Hefficide

The system is rigged to benefit the lawyers and judges. They've made it to where its almost impossible to represent yourself in court with any chance of winning.

I tried to represent myself in my divorce because it should've been a no brainer considering my wife was in jail on 3 counts of child endangerment, but I realized real quick like that I wasn't going to be able to do that, and not a single lawyer I spoke to was willing to work on an hourly basis just to help me get the proper paperwork in order.

My kids and I really could've used that $3500 I had to put up for a retainer.

a reply to: Hefficide

Your wrong this isn't a free speech issue. This is how lexis and others like west law work. They pay lawyers and judges to make comments on legal proceedings. This is indeed copy write infringement because this is there property. You can get access to any legal code through your state but it's not indexed it doesn't show you the legal preferences or the comments on the code. This guy is a thief stealing others work.

If he just posted the documents he wouldn't be in trouble at all. Now you ask why is the state involved answer is simple. It's the way these companies reimburse the state. If I go on west law and look up Georgia state laws they will receive a fee for making it available.. This is how these companies guarantee when new laws are passed they get online versions from the state.

When they receive a new law they will find someone in that state to review and comment usually a judge. He is reimbursed for his time and users get to see the code explained. By posting these online he is directly hurting the states income as every view makes them money. The reason it could be argued he's a terrorist is he is directly hurting the States coffers. Even though reading the article seems he gave himself this status not the state.

So basically we have a guy stealing intellectual property causing others to lose money while he operates his website and continues to solicit money. Seems to me they do need to sue him all his donations were to read copy written material that he didn't own.

a reply to: Hefficide

Its terrorism because they don't like it. And when stupid people don't like something, its called "terrorism" now.

It has replaced more dated terms like "Godless", "Heathen", "Communist", and "Satanic".

a reply to: tsurfer2000h

From the lawsuit as linked above:

20.
Consistent with its strategy of terrorism, Defendant freely admits to the copying and distribution of massive numbers
of Plaintiff’s Copyrighted Annotations on at least its yeswescan.org... website. See Exhibit 3. Defendant also
announced on the yeswescan.org... website that it has targeted the States of Mississippi, Georgia, and Idaho and the District of Columbia for its continued, deliberate and willful copying of copyrighted portions of the annotated codes of those jurisdictions.

a reply to: bigfatfurrytexan

Its terrorism because they don't like it. And when stupid people don't like something, its called "terrorism" now.

Exactly, the state never once called him or considered this terrorism as the original complaint shows.

But I guess if the headline only said he was being sued for copyright infringement it wouldn't get very far as a thread.