TorrentFreak

The place where breaking news, BitTorrent and copyright collide

Anti-Piracy Lawyer Has Been A Very Bad Boy

Andrew Crossley from the now defunct ACS:Law will face the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal later this year. During the hearing he will be forced to face up to his conduct as he carried out so-called Speculative Invoicing against alleged file-sharers in the UK.

The Solicitors Regulatory Authority have just published a list of the charges Crossley will face. They claim that the lawyer:

1) Allowed his independence to be compromised
2) Acted contrary to the best interests of his clients
3) Acted in a way that was likely to diminish the trust the public places in him or in the legal profession
4) Entered into arrangements to receive contingency fees for work done in prosecuting or defending contentious proceedings before the Courts of England and Wales except as permitted by statute or the common law
5) Acted where there was a conflict of interest in circumstances not permitted, in particular because there was a conflict with those of his clients
6) Used his position as a Solicitor to take or attempt to take unfair advantage of other persons being recipients of letters of claim either for his own benefit or for the benefit of his clients.

and finally..

7) Acted without integrity in that he provided false information in statements made to the Court.

Earlier in the year Crossley, a recently declared bankrupt, complained that he has no money to mount a proper defense at the forthcoming SDT hearing. In order to cut costs he requested that all expert evidence be excluded from the Tribunal.

Crossley’s demands were denied across the board. His tribunal will be heard in October.

This post is from the News Bits section of TorrentFreak where we present stories from around the web in a concise summary format. Full TorrentFreak articles can be found here. If you have a tip please let us know. News Bits have their very own RSS feed
  • http://twitter.com/icanhazsake Ninja

    I lol’d. At least the legal blackmailing seems to be pretty much over with this. Major win for the ppl at last.

    Hopefully he’ll be put out of business permanently as a lawyer. Time to get back to the College Andrew ;)

  • Anonymous

    I’d wish I could be there to see him fall.

    • http://tinyurl.com/ANoiXioNA-personal-info ANoiXioNA

      +1 Awww that would be soooo amazing…….

      Shout at him…. I bet you’d rather be queueing for that coffee ..Andrew….

      • Oliver Davenport

        Coffee?

        • Anonymous

          Google it.

        • Anonymous

          Google it.

        • http://tinyurl.com/ANoiXioNA-personal-info ANoiXioNA

          Andrew Crossley’s famous LAST quote…. (after his site DDoS + hacked)

          “”
          “Big whoop… It was only down for a few hours.
          I have far more concern over the fact of my train turning up 10 minutes late or having to queue for a coffee than them wasting my time with this sort of rubbish… typical rubbish from pirates.
          “”

          “Payback is a bitch, isn’t it Andrew?” http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/5850493/ACS-Law_leaked_emails

        • http://tinyurl.com/ANoiXioNA-personal-info ANoiXioNA

          Andrew Crossley’s famous LAST quote…. (after his site DDoS + hacked)

          “”
          “Big whoop… It was only down for a few hours.
          I have far more concern over the fact of my train turning up 10 minutes late or having to queue for a coffee than them wasting my time with this sort of rubbish… typical rubbish from pirates.
          “”

          “Payback is a bitch, isn’t it Andrew?” http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/5850493/ACS-Law_leaked_emails

        • http://tinyurl.com/ANoiXioNA-personal-info ANoiXioNA

          Andrew Crossley’s famous LAST quote…. (after his site DDoS + hacked)

          “”
          “Big whoop… It was only down for a few hours.
          I have far more concern over the fact of my train turning up 10 minutes late or having to queue for a coffee than them wasting my time with this sort of rubbish… typical rubbish from pirates.
          “”

          “Payback is a bitch, isn’t it Andrew?” http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/5850493/ACS-Law_leaked_emails

        • http://twitter.com/icanhazsake Ninja

          Anoix: makes me laugh. Priceless line once put into the current ACS/Andrew situation. Simply priceless!

      • Anonymous

        He can’t buy coffee. He pleaded poverty. (but that’s bullshit – or nobody
        wants to buy his fancy cars, which, in that case need to be impounded and
        sold at a shockingly low price)

        • Ryu1313

          They should take that wonderful car of his and sell it to one of the people he sent a letter to for the price they got quoted in their letter.

        • http://www.xbomber.co.uk/ Crash

          At least ‘his train finally came in’, so to speak . Pity it was a lot more than 10mins late.

  • Guest

    Win

  • Guest

    Correct me if I am wrong but it seems like all of these charges are disciplinary charges and NOT CRIMINAL charges…

    Keeping him from working as an attorney is sweet but I feel like there is ground for a criminal investigation in here…

    Anyway it is still a step in the right direction! Hopefully some criminal charges will follow and maybe he will get to meet “Bubba” in the big house!

    • http://disqus.com/ Rob8urcakes

      Yup, you’re spot-on.
      These 7 ‘charges’ are indeed allegations of disciplinary offences which will each be decided upon by the SDT (ie the Solicitor’s DISCIPLINARY Tribunal) of the profession’s own Solicitors’ Regulation Authority.

      The SRA’s full Code of Conduct for solicitors in England & Wales can be viewed here -
      http://www.sra.org.uk/solicitors/code-of-conduct.page

      But you also raise a VERY important aspect to this whole sorry episode, and that is whether or not Crossley faces criminal charges.

      He can certainly be sued by his victims for damages, but there’s no point in them doing that now that he’s a registered bankrupt because if they win they’ll likely receive no cash whatsoever as they’d simply become another creditor that needs to be paid from his sequestered estate.

      So yes. Criminal charges would indeed be more just, in addition to October’s hearing of the SDT.

      • Strobble

        Once his bankruptcy is final then they can sue… In the USA normally he would go chapter 7 but then it would open him up for more lawsuits that would grab all future assets.

  • Noah C.

    This is almost too funny. He’s charged hundreds of thousands of dollars, and now he had to plea poverty, because he couldn’t pay everything. It’s really sad. He’s a disgrace to the field of Law. I wish I had something clever to say in Latin that had to do with law, but alas, I don’t.

    • http://disqus.com/ Rob8urcakes

      lol, howz about sic transit gloria mundi
      or,
      nil desperandum

      http://translate.google.com/
      falls a bit short in a decent English-version, but you should get the gist of it.

  • Anonymous

    /point
    /laugh

    Enjoy what’s coming to you, dick!

  • Riv

    Don’t get too excited – he’ll probably get off scot-free like he did with the Information Commissioner.

  • Pingback: === popurls.com === popular today

  • Anonymous

    lmao do they have bubba’s in jail in Europe? This is a picture I’d love to see. :P

  • Lambo

    He cant have me

    • Ze de bronze

      Why not?

  • http://www.mark-holland.me.uk mark29

    no money! he lives in a bloody 700,000 pound house and drives a bentley

    • Anonymous

      However he’s been declared bankrupt so his £700k house and bentley will be seized by the Official Receiver, unless by some miracle he can convince the OR that he needs the bentley to get around in as opposed to letting him buy an old banger to get around in.

  • Pingback: Italian ISPs Sued For Ignoring BTjunkie Blockade

  • Pingback: Anti-Piracy Lawyer Has Been A Very Bad Boy | TorrentFreak | NotSoCrazyNews BETA

  • Pingback: makin257 - Anti-Piracy Lawyer Has Been A Very Bad Boy

  • Strobble

    We need those judges in the USA.

  • http://zombo.com zarathustra

    Run, fatboy, run! =]

  • Bits

    Have you forgotten about News Bits? :(

  • Pingback: Italy Censors Proxy That Bypasses BTjunkie and Pirate Bay Block

  • Dethfat

    his money is in switzerland with everyone else’s. it is pretty awesome this guy is going down.

  • BTGuard - BitTorrent Anonymously

NewsBits

Even more news...

  • The Pirate Bay Isn’t Down Completely, Just Having a Few Issues

    Twitter and Facebook, not to mention the TorrentFreak inbox, are currently alive with complaints that The...

  • Pirate Bay Founder Gottfrid Svartholm on Freedom of Speech

    Freedom of speech is a highly valued commodity, but should people be allowed to say whatever...

  • Blu-ray Anti-Piracy Tech Stops Discs and Promotes Purchases

    An anti-piracy system present in all official Blu-ray players since 2012 has received a fresh update...

  • Foxtel Breeds Pirates by Locking Up Game of Thrones

    One of the main reasons why people turn to piracy is the lack of legal alternatives....

  • UK Student Admits Breaching Sony Copyrights With Leak of PS3 SDK

    Last year an Internet user known as El Nomeo leaked version 3.70 of Sony’s Playstation3 SDK...

MostDiscussed

Below are TorrentFreak's most discussed articles of the past month. Join the discussion if you like.

CopyQuote

Left Quote

“The Pirate Bay has been one of the most important movements in Sweden for freedom of speech, working against corruption and censorship.

Peter Sunde Left Quote

PopularArticles

A selection of some TorrentFreak's classics dug up from our archives.