ATTORNEY AT LAW
3555 So. El Camino Real, Suite 610
San Mateo, Califomia 94403
650.341.0548
650.349.8169
April 2, 1999
Re: Defamatory Web-pages Pertaining to Dr. Lawrence Badgley
Dear Mr. Tuttle:
I represent Dr. Lawrence Badgley, a Medical Doctor, who had a lawsuit resolved in his favor and recently discovered that a person unrelated to the case created a web-site that contains pages of libelous claims about him and his court case.
At the doctor's request, I have review the site (domain names; ishius.com; samsloan.com; and shamema.com) and discovered that the owner of the domains Mr. Sam Sloan and your company Best.com is the domain server, hosting and providing web-service for the site.
As an on-line information provider, once you are informed of defamatory statements or have reason to known of defamatory statements contained in publications that you host or distribute, you are subject to liability for continued publication (Dun & Bradstreet Inc. vs Greenmoss Builders, Inc. 472 US 749).
This letter is intended to put you on notice that the information contained on Mr. Sloan's web-pages that reference to Dr. Badgley are defamatory. Not only is the information outrageous and libelous, but it includes letters, purportedly part of the court record, that actually were unsolicited and rejected by the court. As far as motives are concerned, Mr. Sloan apparently is a personal friend of the woman who lost the lawsuit to Dr. Badgley, and thus the pages at the domains are arguable a form of retaliation.
Unless you cease and desist within 20 days from providing the pages that reference Dr. Lawrence Badgley in the above domains known and served by you for Mr. Sloan, I will have no alternative but to file legal action against Best Internet Communications, Inc. for defamation, negligence, and violation of privacy, seeking both general and punitive damages, attorney fees, and court costs.
Since these pages have been published to Internet search engines, I also expect that you will cease publication of Dr. Lawrence Badgley's name to all search engines in association with Mr. Sloan's domains.
Sincerely
Frank J. Potasz
cc: Lawrence Badgley
Sam Sloan
The letter from Frank Potasz complains primarily about a letter I wrote to Bankruptcy Judge King of the San Francisco bankruptcy court dated July 27, 1992, which I have posted at http://www.samsloan.com/bankrupt.htm.
The letter to Judge King appears to have been written by Arden Van Upp. However, Arden Van Upp cannot write even one sentence in proper English. All of her papers and letters were written by me.
When I wrote this letter, Judge King had just announced his retirement. Therefore, this letter was given to his successor judge.
I do not know if it is true as claimed that this letter was rejected for filing. However, I do know for a fact that the judge and all of the lawyers involved read my letter.
Also, when Mr. Potasz says that Dr. Badgley won the case, this is not true. As the letter notes, Judge Williamson originally awarded Dr. Badgley a judgment in the amount of $562,077. However, that judgment was reversed on appeal by the California Court of Appeal on the obvious ground that Judge Williamson had refused to hear the live testimony of witnesses. Everybody knows that the trier of the facts must hear the testimony.
This decision was reported in the California Appellate Reporters as Badgley vs. Van Upp.
By then, both Badgley and Van Upp had filed for bankruptcy. As a result, the case was retried in federal bankruptcy court by Judge Montali. Judge Montali awarded a judgment of $300,000 in favor of Van Upp. Thus the situation shifted from where Van Upp owed Badgley $562,077 to where Badgley owed Van Upp $300,000, a total swing of $862,077.
It is a mystery how Mr. Potasz could claim that his client won the case, when his client clearly lost the case.
Thus, Lawrence Badgley joins Paula Jones and Miss America as among those people who have threatened to sue Sam Sloan.
I was hoping that the letter from Mr. Potasz would provide a point by point refutation to my letter. For example, does Br. Badgley claim that he was not the notorious Dr. Feelgood? Does Dr. Badgley claim that it was not him but somebody else who was photographed by film producer Robert Frank having sexual intercourse with a 14-year-old girl? Does Dr. Badgley claim that it was someone other than himself who was the subject of an article by Truman Capote?
Had Dr. Badgley made any of these claims, I would be happy to publish this on my web site. However, not only does Dr. Badgley not say any of these things, but it was established at the trial before Judge Montali that Dr. Badgley was all of these persons. Dr. Badgley really was the original Dr. Feelgood and Dr. Badgley really was photographed having sexual intercourse with a girl on a plane. These facts played a significant role in the decision by Judge Montali to award a judgment of $300,000 in favor of Arden Van Upp.
Sam Sloan