Dozier Internet Law v. Riley [1]

On September 4, 2008, John Dozier filed a lawsuit [2] in Virginia state court claiming that Ronald Riley's "gripe site" about him and his firm, www.cybertriallawyer-sucks.com [3], violates his law firm's trademark because the site uses the firm's name in conjunction with an embedded link that goes, not to the firm's website, but to a page on inventored.org that lists cease-and-desist letters Riley has received from Dozier and Riley's responses to those letters.

According to Paul Alan Levy [4], Riley's counsel, Dozier "does not seem to have served [the complaint] on Riley.  Instead, he has used the making of a claim for trademark infringement to warn the hosts of Riley’s web site that if they do not take the web site down they risk a further display of Dozier’s wrath, directed at them." 

On October 2, 2008, Riley filed a complaint for declaratory judgment [5] in federal court in the Eastern District of Virginia, seeking a ruling by the court that his use of Dozier's trademarks is not infringing or defamatory.

Update:

11/20/08 - The federal court dismissed [6] Riley's complaint for declaratory judgment based on lack of subject-matter jurisdiction.

12/8/08 - The district court denied [7] the plaintiff's motion to reconsider dismissal [8].

1/6/09 - Plaintiff appeals [9] the district court's order of dismissal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.