from www.reuters.com – Evan Stone considers himself a pirate fighter. According to an interview he gave tech website Ars Technica last February, Stone, of Denton, Texas, filed a series of copyright suits in the Lone Star State against anonymous downloaders of porn movies because he’s “trying to protect the artists.”

He even adopted a crest for his business derived from the old East India company symbol. “Historically, seafaring pirates were terrified of The East India Company (or the ‘mercenaries’ it hired, rather),” he told Ars Technica. “So the crest has become a sort of anti-piracy symbol for me.”

Sounds very swashbuckling, but lawyers from the Public Citizen Litigation Group and the Electronic Frontier Foundation have argued that Stone is more of a hold-up artist than a copyright protector.

The two organizations were appointed to represent 670 John Doe defendants Stone sued in Dallas federal court on behalf of Mick Haig Productions, the German studio that brought you “Der Gute Oncle.” (If you have to ask…)

As soon as they got into the case, EFF and Public Citizen asked U.S. District Judge David Godbey to block Stone from asking Internet service providers to identify the anonymous downloaders, asserting that his modus operandi is to force quick settlements with downloaders who don’t want to be exposed as porn consumers. (Here’s my previous story about the copyright fracas among porn studios, file-sharing services, and downloaders.)

“Plaintiff’s lawyer has not been shy about telling the press that he expects to get settlements precisely because many people who download pornography are unwilling to risk being publicly identified as having done so,” wrote Matthew Zimmerman of EFF and Paul Levy of Public Citizen in a motion to preclude Stone from conducting discovery. “Moreover, the settlement amount is, we believe, carefully selected to be less than most defendants would have to spend to hire a lawyer to defend themselves, even though it is significantly more than the plaintiff stands to gain from an award of actual damages. … Plaintiff’s quest for identifying information in this case, therefore, appears to be nothing more than an effort to use the judicial process to extract settlements on a mass scale.”

Stone told me the public-interest groups have him all wrong.

“Honestly, these folks and I are more alike than different. We both want the system to change,” he said, adding that he used to wear an EFF baseball cap.

Stone said he’s just trying to force Internet service providers to live up to their promises to copyright holders; according to Stone, content producers agreed to refrain from suing ISPs as long as the ISPs helped them identify illegal downloaders. Stone said he’s very selective about the studios he represents and only takes cases from copyright holders who consider litigation a last resort, after their alternative copyright enforcement programs have proved inadequate. He said he only takes 30 percent contingency fees, and settles with John Does for $1500, the statutory damages for two copyright violations.

Stone insists he’s fighting porn piracy for principles, not profits. But he still ran into big trouble in the Haig case. Stone asked for discovery from the Internet service providers without a court order authorizing him to do so. (He said he misunderstood a docket entry and ambiguous court order.)

Last January he dismissed the case against the 670 John Does, but the two public-interest groups asked Godbey to sanction Stone nevertheless for discovery violations. In September, Godbey imposed a $10,000 sanction, awarded legal fees to EFF and Public Citizen, and directed Stone to notify judges of the sanctions order in every other case he’s litigating.

Stone was understandably distressed at the sanction, particularly because he maintains he acted in good faith when he asked the ISPs to identify the Doe downloaders. He told me he also didn’t like the idea of sending the notice to judges in cases that have nothing to do with porn piracy, such as family law disputes. He appealed the sanction order to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and asked Godbey for a stay.

On Tuesday the judge said no. In a 12-page order, Godbey said Stone not only owes the original $10,000, but must also pay $22,000 in attorneys’ fees to the public interest groups and $500 a day in contempt sanctions if he doesn’t comply by next Tuesday. In addition, the judge said Stone must distribute the sanctions order as he originally instructed.

Stone said he’s hoping the Fifth Circuit undoes Godbey’s order. “This isn’t the first time he’s jumped the gun on sanctions,” he told me. “Godbey cannot show bad faith.” The judge was also wrong on discovery of the John Does’ identity, Stone said. Just this week, he said, four other judges have ordered discovery from Internet service providers in porn piracy cases he’s involved in. (He said he’s only litigating a handful of cases directly but is consulting on several others.)

Paul Levy of Public Citizen, meanwhile, told me he hopes Stone’s sanction makes a difference in these cases, but he’s not sure it will. “If he’s making a lot of money, this may be a bump on his nose,” Levy said. On the other hand, he said, Stone’s clients may be spooked that he’s under a court order to notify other judges of the sanction. “The adult entertainment industry,” Levy said, “may have to find another lawyer.”