"Remember the Thomas M. Cooley law school? The school, generally considered a 4th tier bottom of the barrel law school, made some news last month by suing some anonymous critics, who appeared to be unhappy former students blogging about the school. The school has also been sued for apparent misleading employment stats. Of course, somewhat related to all of this is the ridiculously laughable attempt by Thomas Cooley to hide its poor reputation by creating its own ranking system that puts itself as the number 2 law school in the country. " "Anyway, the lawyer representing Cooley, Michael Coakley, who attended the (according to Cooley itself) far inferior law school of the University of Michigan, apparently decided to take some questionable steps in identifying one of the bloggers...." See the Full Article: Lawyers For Thomas Cooley Law School Skirt Legal & Ethical Questions In Uncovering Anonymous Blogger They're Suing Add Comment  "Representatives at three large Tampa area law firms, requesting to speak without attribution, said they have no Cooley graduates and consider it a school that admits just about any applicant." Tampa Bay Business Journal  In addition to the numerous constitutional lawyers, electronic freedom fighters, consumer advocacy and human rights groups, and media organizations that have condemned Thomas M. Cooley's lawsuits against bloggers and internet commentators and stood up in support of this very blog now comes a law professor (from a REAL law school) calling out Cooley for its unethical abuse of the same legal system it hypocritically attempts to "teach" to its students along with knowledge, skills, and ethics (LULZ). In response to a commentator who references this blog and points out the absurdity and baseless nature of Cooley's "lawsuit", ironically pointing that Cooley will likely be responsible for creating Michigan law on anonymity (on the wrong end of the law, of course), the most honest law professor in the industry, Paul Campos of Inside the Law School Scam, responds by branding Cooley's claims as a SLAPP. The word SLAPP and Cooley are becoming synonymous, it seems. For More Click Below: http://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2011/12/an-early-christmas-present-for-the-prospective-law-school-class-of-2015  Here is another piece that picked up on Cooley's frivolous SLAPPs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SLAPP) against internet bloggers that slipped through my radar a few months back. Link is below the excerpts. "Thomas M. Cooley Law School, a bit like the hunt for the alleged strawberry miscreant in "Caine Mutiny," is relentlessly pursuing once-anonymous blogger [Rockstar05] who had been critical of it. This seems incongruous for an institution of professional learning." "But, in terms of the law school, the stakes are sky-high for the credibility and marketability of it as a law school. This pursuit of the alleged miscreant can turn him into a digital folk hero. The school would come across, at best, as thin-skinned. At worst, it could be perceived as engaging in a complex scheme to conceal accurate information about its admissions policies, job placement record, and the compensation its JDs receive." For More See: http://businesslawdaily.net/2011/10/15/thomas-cooley-law-school-pr-mess/  Here is a fine piece linked below exposing Cooley for its shameless abuse of the legal system and blatant disregard of the First Amendment it hypocritically purports to "teach" its students as a law school. Perhaps that is why Cooley students are some of the worst in the country at passing the bar and fare even worse in terms of finding employment. Adding insult to injury is the measly $49,000 per year a Cooley Law grad can command in private practice as the most lucrative job market after dumping $165,000+ on a toilet Cooley degree for those who do manage to find employment. Check out the link below. "What can we say about a law school, whose purpose is to train future lawyers, that doesn't believe in the fundamental right of freedom of speech under the First Amendment? Such is the case with the Thomas M. Cooley Law School, which is suing a blogger critical of it under a frivolous claim of defamation, which can best be described as a Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation (SLAPP) suit intended to intimidate free speech." Continue reading on Examiner.com Legal hypocrisy gets extreme - Detroit national politics | Examiner.com http://www.examiner.com/national-politics-in-detroit/legal-hypocrisy-gets-extreme#ixzz1kJVkOFBy  The Michigan Press Association, Gannett Company, Inc., Scripps Media, Inc. (as owner and operator of WXYZ-TV in Detroit), the Detroit News, Inc., The Macomb Daily, and The Rail joined the Public Citizen in Michigan Appeals Court filing an amicus brief supporting the position that the Thomas M. Cooley Law School should not be entitled to proceed with their frivolous claims and should be subjected to scrutiny under the widely accepted constitutional Dendrite standard. Gannet Company is the largest U.S. newspaper publisher as measured by total daily circulation. Its assets include the national newspaper USA Today and the weekly USA Weekend. The Detroit News is one of the two largest newspapers in Detroit. Michigan Press Association Amicus Brief and Public Citizen Brief: 
 Now here is a stunner. In their further attempts to police the internet, the Cooley administration seems to have abandoned their pricey PR trolls (err, I mean team) in favor of sending out the Deans themselves to various internet forums to "defend" the "Cooley Law proposition" using flawed logic that a 5th grader could see through and SURPRISE SURPRISE, more misleading information! I assume this is their reaction to the overwhelming and abundant criticisms directed toward the school by the internet community and the vast and ever-growing body of information that prospective students have access to at the click of a Google search (seriously, check the results...it is NOT pretty). Last I heard, the Deans of multiple Cooley campuses are actually REPLYING on comment threads on the link at the bottom of this page. Needless to say, when someone points out the faulty logic, circular and elementary Cooley reasoning, and other gaping holes in their propaganda, they just choose to ignore it. Apparently they have better things to do than actually TEACHING somebody something- marketing and recruitment OF COURSE!! After all, the resources at Cooley are already being efficiently utilized to make sure this is a top rate school, its students are prepared for the bar and the legal profession, and that they find lucrative and rewarding employment (??!!!!) . Check out the Cooley rankings where where Cooley ranks itself as the second best law school in the country according to objective data despite ranking itself 181 out of 193 law school in terms of percentage of graduates employed, 191 out of 193 law schools in terms of student-faculty ratio, and 160 out of 193 schools ranked in bar passage rates (http://www.cooley.edu/rankings/_docs/Judging_12th_Ed_2010.pdf page 395/424). When the Dean's are simply front-liners trying to sell you the Cooley law proposition with no accountability for the end result (read: six digits of debt and no employment), it is not a surprise they are focusing their time, efforts, and resources on keeping enrollment up and not on what on the fate of their students or the legal profession will be three years down the line. Perhaps they feel threatened their lucrative positions as law school Deans are at stake. After all Cooley made $271,139,283 in 2009 (http://www.guidestar.org/FinDocuments/2010/381/988/2010-381988915-075b3670-9.pdf), that's two hundred seventy one million dollars one hundred and thirty nine thousand two hundred and eighty three dollars- which they apparently are not content with. Either way, Cooley Deans can add one more role to their positions, "Actively surveying and monitoring the internet for negative reports regarding Cooley Law School and countering it with meaningless and intellectually insulting propaganda in an attempt to maximize incentive compensation by increasing student enrollment and retention." The RETIRED FOUNDER of Cooley, Thomas E. Brennan even went out his way to comment on this article to defend Cooley. Perhaps now he can justify why he gets paid $368,581 (Page 39- http://www.guidestar.org/FinDocuments/2009/381/988/2009-381988915-0661fd69-9.pdf) year to otherwise literally DO NOTHING in his position as "Professor Emeritus" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emeritus). My next piece will be titled "Dissecting Cooley Logic", where I tear apart what these Deans (read morally bankrupt and unethical shills) set forth as facts, their misrepresentations, and misleading, self-serving propaganda. Stay tuned. http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/cooley_law_dean_hits_apocalyptic_view_of_legal_market_cites_employment_stat  For the truncated version: http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNLJ.jsp?id=1202518943064&Ripping_a_critics_mask_off&slreturn=1 What was your initial reaction when you learned that you were being sued? Did you ever think that you might be sued as a result? Absolutely not. Initially I was almost certain it was a Cooley defender attempting to play a prank on me. My blog seemed to attract mostly bitter Cooley students angry about anyone speaking ill of their school despite not being able to identify anything false or inaccurate in my blog post. However, when I went on the Internet to find Cooley proudly and prominently displaying news of their lawsuits on their website I was just kind of shocked. My website was confined to numerous links for the factual material and I added some of my personal experiences, opinions, and a fair amount of biting commentary. I did not ever contemplate that my blog would be the subject of a lawsuit, or that anything contained in it would be alleged to be “defamatory”. I found it interesting that Cooley’s same PR team decided to leave out the breaking news of it being sued later the same summer (August 2011) in a class action lawsuit for fraud, negligent misrepresentation, and deceptive business practices for $250,000,000 by Cooley grads. Why did you start the Cooley scam blog to begin with? What did you hope to achieve? I decided to create the Thomas M. Cooley Law School Scam blog after Cooley issued a press release this past February 2011 claiming they were the the second best law school in the United States of America (out of 193 ranked law schools), right after Harvard, according to “objective criteria” and a seemingly impartial ranking system called “Judging the Law Schools.” I dug a bit deeper and found a few flaws within their very own ranking system: For example, the ranking system EQUALLY WEIGHTS traditional indicators of a law schools performance, namely, its mediocre employment rate (#181st), student faculty ratio (#190), and first-time bar passage rate (#160th) with less traditional and measures less indicative of success that impact one’s decision to attend a law school which includes but is not limited to the availability of library chairs at the institutions four campus libraries (#2), total faculty (#2), and total law school enrolment (#1). Furthermore, their entire ranking system consisting of 40 indicators has 10 indicators -25% of the entire ranking- solely devoted to library size factors. Cooley clearly uses its self-published rankings as a shameless marketing tool where any large institution with four campuses (which is virtually unheard of for a law school) would be inclined to score better comparatively. I was motivated by their intellectually dishonest rankings and manipulative, shameless, and deceptive marketing campaign to recruit students which I believe is extremely misleading and may potentially be interpreted by some prospective students as a legitimate alternative ranking system to other more credible rankings, such as the US News. I also felt that Cooley’s press releases served as little more than propaganda and distorted the bitter reality that Cooley is more well-known as a degree mill, and a school of last resort which has one of the worst reputations and one of the most dubious distinctions in the legal community. The Cooley brand is well known for the irreparable stigma it carries, and with the filing of these SLAPP suits as a reckless abuse of the legal system it is unlikely that their reputation as a legal institution can fall much lower. It is with this sense of duty I created my blog site so that prospective students would be able to access the information that Cooley does not publish on their website so that prospective students can make more INFORMED DECISIONS prior to deciding what is likely to be their biggest financial commitment in their lives. The blog was to serve a strong “Buyer Beware”message to students considering Cooley as an option for law school. My underlying concerns were that ambitious students leverage their entire futures to attend law schools including their financial stability in the pursuit of a ‘higher education’. The value of these life-altering decisions is extremely questionable in the lower-tiered schools. The decision to attend law school can affect one’s entire life, including their ability to buy homes, get married, and start families. A J.D. is one of the most grossly overpriced products on the American market. I personally believe students should be able to make informed decisions and have access to information and biting critiques rearding the prudency of a law school investment given the state of the current legal job market. Especially when incurring hundreds of thousands of NON-DISCHARGEABLE DEBT. I felt that if I could even influence one person’s decision whether or not to attend law school or whether to attend Cooley then my time and effort in developing my site would be worthwhile. People have a right to access information- if Cooley can launch their marketing propaganda non-stop and parade around proclaiming themselves as the 2nd best law school in the country then why can I not provide a hard hitting critique and assessment of the value of a Cooley degree and their unethical, misleading, and deceptive business practices? Why did you decide to fight the suit, rather than submit to the initial demands that Cooley was making? To me there was never really a choice in the first place. If they were to e-mail me prior to filing the lawsuit or identify anything they considered to be defamatory I would have gladly removed the material if I agreed. If they threatened legal action, I would have complied despite my personal disagreement with their allegations. No one enjoys a lawsuit, and given that I do not have the time, or financial resources to defend my rights I would have reluctantly acquiesced and deleted the site. Here they never contacted me at all until the day after they filed and publicized the lawsuit. I immediately offered to delete the website if they would drop the lawsuit, allowing me to carry on with my life and 3L studies at my new law school. They seemed less interested in me deleting the website or removing anything that was potentially “defamatory” than they were in my identity. They declined my offer and demanded my identity immediately, stating that if I gave it to them right away they would “consider” a non-monetary settlement. I perceived the communication as somewhat hostile, strategic, and a bullying tactic, so I decided to “lawyer-up”. After I retained an attorney, my attorney also communicated that I would be willing to delete the website; instead their lawyers refused and remained insistent on knowing who I am without putting anything concrete on the table. They have claimed that your blog includes defamatory statements. What is your response to that charge? There is nothing defamatory in my blog post. In fact, if you view the Complaint itself you will see that they have pieced together different parts of my blog, taken things out of context, manipulated my statements, and filled in a lot of their own words in order to put forth a facially non-frivolous lawsuit. The claims are really weak. They allege thatI refer to them as a “multi-million dollar business”, well first I don’t quite understand how being called a business is defamatory. Second, by means of their second charge in their complaint they concede they are a business by alleging I have intentionally interfered with BUSINESS relations. Third, their own 2009 IRS Form 990 which is open to public inspection proves they are a multi-million dollar business with gross receipts totaling $271,139,283. Do you see how profitable it is to be a law school? It seems Cooley has literally attempted to piece together a claim by attempting to plant non-defamatory factual statements I made and intersperse it with my opinion and their self-created statements distorting and intentionally manipulating certain things in my blog post in order to file a claim against me. In my opinion, holding yourself out to the general public and prospective students as the second best law school in the country especially when your bar passage rates are in the bottom 25% of schools after taking into account that they fail out over 25% of the weaker students in their entering classes which inflates their bar passage rates to begin with, and that the Cooley employment rate is one of the worst in the country is providing false and misleading information in order to attract and retain consumers. Clearly, Cooley is trying to police the internet. Cooley seems angry over my critique of their school and calling them out for their questionable practices and seems intent on harassing me with lawsuits. If I proclaimed to the world that I was the second best at anything in America I would expect that I would be inviting a fair amount of criticism in my direction unless I had formally been honored with a silver medal in that category. Cooley is a public figure; they hold themselves out to the public as the biggest law school in America, and as the second best legal institution- is this any way to deal with some of your inevitable critics? I am guilty of nothing more than identifying the institutional hypocrisy evident in Cooley’s business practices which involve millions of federally backed student loan dollars using publicly available information which includes data from the ABA, the US News, the Cooley website, and other sources which are all referenced within the original blog post. This appears to be little more than a textbook SLAPP suit which is intended to intimidate free speech and amounts to a severe abuse of the legal system and legal process. This leads me to believe that Cooley does not in fact truly believe in the very first amendment it teaches. Any prospective student should be wary of such a hypocritical school. Cooley then proceeds to openly boast about integrity and ethics at the core of its institution of higher learning. In my opinion, Cooley is likely the most unethical law school business in existence, lacking any sense of institutional integrity whatsoever. How concerned are you about being unmasked at this point? What are your biggest concerns about having your named revealed? I am pretty sure I am doing the right thing here. These lawsuits have been universally derided in the legal community and have angered human rights organizations and first amendment lawyers across the country. Public Citizen has already intervened as Amicus delivering a strong message that under the balancing test put forth under the Dendrite Rule the balance sharply tips in favor of non-disclosure of my identity given how weak Cooley’s claims are, stating that Cooley has not proved anything is defamatory or that they can prevail on their claims. I’m sure that no one would like to be publicly identified with a lawsuit due to the stigma associated with it. Now this is a civil case, but in criminal cases I am sure everyone is aware of the bias when one hears that an individual has been charged of a crime. There is an immediate presumption towards a defendants culpability that comes to mind despite the ideal that a defendant is innocent until proven guilty. I have had a lot of people reach out to me and offer me support. I’d like to think I am fighting the good fight. If my name does get revealed I just hope that the majority of people are able or willing to dig and read between the lines (as so few are) and see this for what it is- a frivolous lawsuit filed to harass a critic, which is the definition of a SLAPP suit. When they do a bit of research and realize that what I’m saying is the truth, I would hope that they too voice their outrage over Cooley and perhaps down the line there will be more scrutiny of Cooley by Consumer Protection agencies or the ABA. How has the suit impacted your life? As a 3L law student who works 20 hours a week, attends classes full-time, and is working toward another professional designation simultaneously while preparing to write the bar exam in the upcoming months this has all been a bit overwhelming. Many 3L students do not budget in the time commitments, effort, or emotional investment required in being harassed by lawsuits into their normal work load. Thankfully my attorney has been sympathetic to my financial situation; otherwise I would be facing additional crushing financial burdens that are some of the additional intended goals of such SLAPP suits. I can’t say I enjoy squaring off against a law school with a seemingly endless supply of financial resources, artillery of lawyers, and a full PR team. I’m sure that no one would enjoy fighting Goliath as a tiny David. As I mentioned I have several personal and professional commitments which remain my priorities and so the lawsuit remains a hassle. I preferred life without lawsuits, but if this lawsuit can in any way increase the spotlight on Cooley’s questionable and unethical business practices, help reform law school reporting in general, or inform potential Cooley students of the bigger picture surrounding the Cooley Law School proposition on a larger platform, I would feel that something good has come of all this. Do you regret starting the blog? Not at all. I truly believe that I was performing a public service. In what world does it make any financial or economic sense to invest $150,000+ and three years of your life into a Cooley degree which (generously) lists their entering private sector salary at $51,000 and an employment rate that ranks 181/193 other law schools in the country? Keep in mind that these figures do not take into account the actual response rate of graduating classes, whether the employment reported requires a J.D., and that generally unemployed or underemployed individuals will be less likely to report unemployment or mediocre wages/employment. Law school is now a billion dollar industry with loose reporting standards in dire need of reform in terms of greater transparency in reporting. Student loan debt has now surpassed revolving debt (mostly credit cards) in the United States of America. Given the financial dollar amounts at stake I would go as far as to suggest that there needs to be SEC-type regulation of law school reporting. Surely there would be an outrage if financial statements by publicly traded companies were fudged. What about law school individual investors who invest hundreds of thousands of federally backed loan funds into these law schools? I personally believe Cooley is one of the biggest offenders! There lies a deep humanitarian crisis in the corporatization of law schools. It is completely unethical for law schools (again, specifically Cooley as the biggest offender) to continue getting richer off of indentured students using federally backed student loan dollars who have done nothing wrong besides pursuing higher education in hopes of achieving their ambitions and goals and leading a rewarding, fulfilling, and financially secure life with little regard to the employment prospects or future financial well-being of your students. The average starting salary for entering attorneys has deteriorated markedly each year since the recession due to a poor job market and the continuing oversupply of attorneys. Some numbers estimate the average salary for a starting attorney position is now around $70,000- keep in mind that outliers from HYS may still command those lucrative $160,000/year salaries that television shows glamorize and can significantly distort the average. Despite the poor outlook for law school graduates the ABA continues to accredit new schools each year and institutions such as Cooley continue to increase enrolment, expand their operations, and increase tuition each year despite a contracting job market. Further, much of the legal job market has been restructured to a temporary and part-time legal job market. I recall NALP statistics pegging the number of JD graduates in 2009 around 44,000 for a total of 27,500 jobs requiring a JD, further, the 27,500 jobs are not necessarily attorney positions (simply JD required) and do not take into account temporary or part-time legal employment. Furthermore, clarity and transparency into Cooley’s PR propaganda is of public concern. Providing clarity and transparency into what Cooley projects in attracting the largest student body in America is very critical for law school consumers and on a larger scale society in general given the oversaturation of the legal job market and impending “bubble burst” with respect to higher education, which is strongly driven by law schools. Law schools are deceiving students, but are also abusing taxpayers through taking advantage of federally backed funds that many law school graduates may not be able to afford to repay. In the end, society will be hurt the most. I felt certain things needed to be said in the interests of society’s welfare and felt morally and ethically obligated to take a stand. It is with this sense of moral duty and altruistic ideals I created my blog site. However, by being inspired and taking the initiative to voice my concerns I have become the target of Cooley’s abuse. There are a lot of people who have anonymous blogs that are critical of law schools. Do you have any advice or words of wisdom for them? My advice would be to responsibly continue in what you believe in and advocate for change. There needs to be freedom of information. The whole idea behind lawsuits of this nature is to intimidate, frighten, and silence free speech. It is a SLAPP-Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation. It is by its very nature designed to silence criticism and free speech and discouraging public participation by instilling fear of being sued and the burdens associated with it. The whole goal is to crush the opposition no matter what the underlying merits of the suit. They will harass you, intimidate you, and burden you in any way, shape, or form. It may be emotionally, mentally, and financially taxing. I am presently a victim of such a suit, and let me tell you, it is not an experience I would recommend to others. However, I do believe that very few law schools, if any, would engage in such an abuse of the legal system. Many reputable organizations would find it better to simply ignore and dismiss any criticisms from a blogger. Indeed litigating these matters is a very questionable tactic. It also has the unintended effect of inviting more publicity onto what was considered “defamatory” in the first place, which is known as the Striesand Effect, which I’m hoping in light of new developments will be renamed to the Cooley Effect in honor of Cooley’s antics. Law schools are currently getting sued all over the country- there is merit to what the anonymous bloggers are saying. Schools are beginning to be reprimanded (lightly) after determining that they have fudged numbers in the past, the US News has announced tighter reporting requirements from law schools beginning next year due to the continuing pressure and criticisms. But Cooley is the ONLY law school that has gone out and pre-emptively sued its critics….it is also the only law school with five campuses spanning two states…it is also the only law school that issues inherently flawed press releases claiming the legal profession has strong employment rates and remains a good investment….all this while having one of the worst employment and bar passage rates amongst law schools and by the same breath declaring itself the second best law school in the country (next to Harvard)…catch my drift? My ultimate advice is to do your research, exercise your right to free speech, continue being critical on matters of public concern, and remember that consumers have a right to access information. In other words: rock on.  First Amendment Attorney Marc Randazza recently published a blog post that called Cooley a "toilet law school" which had filed a "feces defamation suit". Here are some entertaining excerpts: "Cooley truly is on a level all its own in embodying all that is wrong with legal education. At the very beginning of its Complaint, Cooley brags about having the largest enrollment and four campuses, as if this is a mark of accomplishment. Harvard and Georgetown have large law school enrollments – but they also send many of their students, and likely the preponderance of them, onto gainful employment – or employment period." "Thomas M. Cooley Law School is a standalone punchline within the legal profession. I’m familiar with its absurdly large class sizes, its questionable practice of culling the bottom few percent of its students each year to ensure high enough bar passage rates to maintain its tenuous grasp on ABA accreditation, and its bizarre self-ranking system that places an inordinate emphasis on library seating capacity." "If someone is accusing your nationally mocked law school of being a scam, perhaps bringing a lawsuit over such allegations isn’t the best way to disprove them." "This lawsuit is a heinous crime against free expression. May an even worse pox than the one currently afflicting it befall that institution for turning the courts into an instrument to beat down free speech and censor the reality that everyone – including many jobless and hopeless Cooley alumni – knows to be true: Cooley sucks." For more of the article visit the Legal Satyricon at: http://randazza.wordpress.com/2011/09/30/toilet-law-school-files-feces-defamation-suit/  Public Citizen Tells Court: School Has Not Proven Defamation, Court Should Protect Critic’s Anonymity http://www.citizen.org/documents/Cooley-v-Does-Amicus-Brief-Supporting-Motion-Quash.pdf WASHINGTON, D.C. – The identity of a blogger who criticized his law school online should not yet be revealed, Public Citizen said in an amicus brief filed today in a Michigan court. Thomas Cooley Law School, which has several campuses in Michigan and one in Florida, is suing the author of a blog post that the school says defamed it. The blog post claimed that Cooley is a bad law school that uses misleading statements about the school’s value to attract students and that the school uses underhanded tactics to milk students of additional tuition. Cooley has not met the criteria needed to justify unmasking an anonymous blogger, Public Citizen said in the brief. In fact, the law school has failed to prove that the blog post is even defamatory. “The mere fact that a plaintiff has filed a lawsuit over a particular piece of speech does not create a compelling government interest in taking away the defendant’s anonymity,” said Paul Alan Levy, an attorney with Public Citizen who specializes in Internet free speech. “Setting the bar too low for disclosure would have a chilling effect on free speech. It is especially disconcerting here that a law school is the plaintiff trying to suppress one of its students’ voices.” Cooley Law School sparked a national controversy in 1996 when it manipulated statistics to show that it was the 12th best law school in the country; this year, it added eight more factors to its test and now claims Cooley as the second best law school in the country. Among other things, some have complained that the law school misrepresented data about its students’ post-graduation employment. The blogger, a former Cooley student, detailed several critiques of the school in a blog post entitled, “Thomas Cooley Law School Scam.” Several other anonymous people posted additional criticisms in the blog’s comment section. In response, Cooley sued both the blogger (identified as John Doe) and three anonymous commenters on July 14 in Lansing, Mich., charging them with defamation. The blogger presumably learned of the suit by reading a press account, then got a lawyer and filed a motion to quash any subpoenas to the blog’s hosting service. Now, the court will examine what the school should have to show to justify stripping the blogger of his anonymity. “At this point, Cooley has claimed only that some false statements have been made about it,” Levy said. “Now it has to show that the statements on which it has sued are defamatory statements of fact, not just opinions, and to present evidence that the factual statements are false.” To be able to obtain the blogger’s identity, Public Citizen argues in its brief, Cooley should have to notify him, and it should have to point out the specific speech that it claims is defamatory so that the court can weigh each claim and the evidence that supports it. The court should then weigh the potential harm to the school from being unable to proceed with a defamation suit and compare it to the harm the blogger would suffer from losing his anonymity. Only the notification has been accomplished. Public Citizen urges the court to protect the anonymous blogger against being identified unless Cooley can point to defamatory speech and present evidence in support of its suit. ### Public Citizen is a national, nonprofit consumer advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C. For more information, please visit www.citizen.org. http://www.citizen.org/pressroom/pressroomredirect.cfm?ID=3420
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