Russell Doty, a former candidate for local political office in Montana, subpoenaed The Billings Gazette, seeking identifying information for three anonymous individuals who posted comments to an article on the newspaper's website in 2008 using the pseudonyms "CutiePie," "Always, wondering," and "High Plains Drifter."  Doty issued the subpoena in connection with a defamation lawsuit against his former political rival, Brad Molnar, in which he alleged that Molnar made false statements in 2004 concerning Doty's qualifications to run for office. 

Doty alleged that Molnar was one of the pseudonymous posters (Molnar denied this in a deposition), and that the other posters might serve as witnesses about the harm to his reputation caused by Molnar's 2004 statements.  The Billings Gazette filed a motion to quash the subpoena, arguing that Montanta's shield law protected it from having to disclose the commenters' IP and email addresses. 

On September 3, 2008, Judge Todd Baugh of Montana's 13th Judicial District granted the motion to quash, ruling that Montana's shield law protected the commenters' identifying information.  Montana's shield law says that a news organization or any person "connected with or employed by [a news organization] for the purpose of gathering, writing, editing, or disseminating news” may not be required to "disclose any information obtained or prepared or the source of that information . . . if the information was gathered, received, or processed in the course of [a reporter's] employment or [a news organization's] business."  Mont. Code § 26-1-902(1).  Judge Baugh agreed with the Gazette's argument that this language is broad enough to encompass data gathered when a newspaper website user posts a comment. 

In March 2008, Lawrence Sinclair sued three pseudonymous Internet users -- TubeSockTedD, mzmolly, and Owningliars -- for defamation in federal district court in the District of Columbia. 

In late 2007/early 2008, Sinclair published a YouTube video and blog claiming that he had engaged in sexual activities and done drugs with then-presidential candidate Barack Obama. This sparked a vociferous response from many Internet users, who criticized Sinclair and challenged his claims about Obama. 

According to court documents, one such Internet user, "TubeSockTedD," allegedly posted a video on YouTube that stated "Larry Sinclair is Spreading Lies About Obama."  Days later, another Internet user going by "Owningliars" allegedly posted a statement on Digg.com, linking back to an unspecified video, urging readers to watch it as "proof" that Sinclair was lying, and stating that Sinclair was in a mental hospital when he claimed to have met Obama.  Later still, another Internet user going by "mzmolly" allegedly posted a comment on a forum on Democratic Underground, repeating the claim that Sinclair was a former mental patient.

After Sinclair filed suit, he subpoenaed Democratic Underground, Google, and Digg seeking identifying information about the pseudonymous defendants.  Paul Alan Levy of Public Citizen, representing both mzmolly and Democratic Underground, objected to the subpoena in a strongly worded letter. Sinclair then moved to compel Democratic Underground to disclose mzmolly's identity, and both mzmolly and Democratic Underground opposed the motion to compel, arguing that First Amendment protection for anonymous speech shielded mzmolly's identity from disclosure under the circumstances. 

In February 2009, the district court issued an opinion denying the motion to compel and dismissing the complaint in its entirety.  The court held that Sinclair was not permitted to compel the identification of the three pseudonymous defendants because he could not meet the heightened standard required by the First Amendment.

Specifically, the court held that Sinclair's complaint was facially invalid because it did not plead facts necessary to establish the court's subject-matter jurisdiction or personal jurisdiction over the pseudonymous defendants.  In addition, the court ruled that Sinclair's defamation claims failed as a matter of law because he did not plead either actual malice or special damages, and because section 230 of the Communications Decency Act protected mzmolly and Owningliars for "simply summarizing and reporting information obtained from" a third party.

Although it quashed the subpoena and dismissed the complaint, the district court refused to award mzmolly and Democratic Underground sanctions against Sinclair because of the novel areas of law involved. 

Warren, Michigan commissioner David Koury filed a defamation lawsuit against an anonymous Internet user who criticized him in online forum postings.  According to a Macomb Daily report, the complaint does not specify the message board(s) that contain the allegedly defamatory statements.  Koury reportedly plans to subpoena web hosts and ISPs related to the message board(s) in order to obtain information about the anonymous poster.

UPDATE: 

On 5/11/2009 the court granted Koury's motion for sanctions against Jane Doe, aka "Joeyondalls" and his/her attorney. It appears that Doe moved for a motion to quash the the subpoena because he/she had not been served. On 4/24/09 Koury presented evidence of service. 

In January 2009, Thomas Garrett, a Virginia chicken farmer, publicist, and self-proclaimed "Hollywood insider," subpoenaed blogger Waldo Jaquith, who publishes cvillenews.com, a community news blog about Charlottesville, Virginia.  Garrett's lawyer served the subpoena in connection with his defamation lawsuit against The Hook, a weekly newspaper in Charlottesville that also publishes content on its website.  For details on the lawsuit, see our related database entry, Garrett v. The Hook.

Jaquith blogged about the Garrett-Hook lawsuit on December 23, 2008.  His post, entitled "The Hook Sued For Defamation," gave background on the lawsuit, quoted Hook editor Hawes Spencer's comments on it, and explained the elements of a defamation claim.  He also made some critical comments about Garrett: 

I can sympathize with The Hook in their continued coverage of him. In writing this blog entry this afternoon, it’s impossible to ignore the really sketchy aspects about this guy. Seriously, look at this magazine that he claims to have been on the cover of. This was obviously patched together in Microsoft Paint. It just screams “bad photoshop job.” (The fact that the magazine doesn’t seem to exist doesn’t help any.) Then there’s his PR firm’s website, hosted on Angelfire. Remember them? The free website hosting service from the mid-90s? Used primary to host webpages for middle school girls professing their love for boy bands? That’s where his company’s website is, at the address http://www.angelfire.com/film/tgj/. Though the site claims to be at garretticonspr.com, that domain is unregistered. In short, Garrett looks like a train wreck in slow motion, and I get that The Hook is just watching and waiting for his big finish.

As a result of this post, Garrett's attorney served Jaquith with a subpoena as part of discovery in his lawsuit against The Hook.  Among other things, the subpoena requests the names and/or IP addresses for everyone who posted a comment to Jaquith's December 23 post.  (As of January 29, there were 81 comments to the post.)  It also seeks IP addresses for every viewer of the post and all logs generated in connection with it. Beyond that, it asks Jaquith for every email or written communication he has sent or received relating to the post or Thomas Garrett, as well as any post, comment, or other writing Jacquith has made on other sites.

The return date on the subpoena is February 2, 2009.  Jaquith has indicated that hiring a lawyer to quash the subpoena is beyond his budget, but he plans to fight the subpoena, acting as his own attorney.

Update:

01/31/2009 - Waldo Jaquith filed a motion to quash the subpoena.

02/13/2009 - Garrett filed a motion to compel compliance with the subpoena.

03/05/2009 - Waldo Jacquith filed a memorandum in opposition to the motion to compel.