SI03 v. Does [1]

SI03, Inc., the company that makes the "Syntrax" line of nutritional supplements, sued 31 individual John Doe defendants and 5 Doe companies over derogatory comments made about Syntrax on the BodyBuilding.com Forums [2].  The complaint claimed that some of the individual Doe defendants were agents of the Doe companies, believed to be Syntrax competitors.  

SIo3 alleged that the anonymous posters made defamatory statements on the forums, suggesting in numerous posts that Syntrax products caused ill-health effects and that SI03 had engaged in unethical conduct.  The complaint, filed in federal district court in Illinois, included claims of defamation, trade libel, commercial disparagement, tortious interference with prospective economic advantage, and civil conspiracy, as well as breach of the Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act (815 Ill. Comp. Stat. 505/1), and the Uniform Deceptive Trade Practices Act (815 Ill. Comp. Stat. 510/1).

The U.S. District Court in the Northern District of Illinois dismissed SI03's claim without prejuduce on the ground that it had not sufficiently identified the defendants to determine whether the court had personal jurisdiction over them. However, the court granted SI03 permission to conduct expedited discovery in order to ascertain the identity of the defendants for the purposes of determining jurisdiction. 

SI03 subpoenaed Bodybuilding.com for the identity of the posters, which  Bodybuilding.com resisted on the basis that a subpoena could not be issued because SI03's complaint was no longer active.  SI03 sought and obtained clarification from the court that it was permitted to use a subpoena.

When Bodybuilding.com still refused to hand over its members' information, SI03 filed a motion to compel and a motion to preserve electronic evidence in the U.S. District Court for the District of Idaho, where Bodybuilding.com is based.  The Idaho district court dismissed the motion to compel on the ground that SI03 had not provided adequate notice to the Doe defendants.  The court granted the motion to preserve evidence in part, ordering BodyBuilding.com to preserve the requested data but not requiring the site to turn it over to a court or third party.

Update:

06/27/08 - SI03 filed a renewed motion to compel.