Owner of Neurodiversity.com Subpoenaed in Autism Suit.

kristin — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 09:37:15 -0800

Kathleen is the owner of neurodiversity.com, one of the most comprehensive resources online in the topic of Autism Spectrum Disorders. Neurodiversity is just one person with a domain name and a computer, not a corporation, or a money-making enterprise, but apparently having good research skills and a willingness to share what you know is becoming legally problematic. Last week, Kathleen has received a subpoena commanding her to appear for deposition and document production in Rev. Lisa Sykes and Seth Sykes’ $20,000,000 personal injury lawsuit, Sykes v. Bayer. That subpoena request, that she turn over every piece of autism-related correspondence and/or contact she has ever had with any company, government agency, religious group, or any other person with any interest in autism, which includes all contact and correspondence with other autism bloggers. They are also asking for all of her financial records. Neurodiversity.com has posted about the Sykes ongoing litigation previously, and Kathleen has been outspoken against Sykes use of her church as a platform for her lawsuit, but this subpoena smacks of intimidation, given that Kathleen is not an expert, a scientist, has never met Sykes, nor been employed by Bayer. In her motion to quash the subpoena, Kathleen writes, in part:

The subpoena was not issued in good faith because its manifest purpose is not to elicit information relevant to determining Bayer’s liability for Wesley Sykes’ medical and developmental problems, but to indulge his parents’ and their attorney’s curiosity about my motivations and associations; to aggressively communicate their suspicion that I am not merely a fellow citizen who openly, intelligently and conscientiously disagrees with their public statements and actions, but a covert agent of the government, the pharmaceutical industry, or some other hidden force; to disrupt my relationships with my associates and news sources; and to intimidate, harass and retaliate against me for exercising my constitutional right to report and express opinions about matters of widespread public interest in which plaintiffs and plaintiffs’ counsel are involved. These are not legitimate reasons to invoke the judicial subpoena power. Indeed, in so doing, Mr. Shoemaker has engaged in a sanctionable abuse of his authority as an officer of the court.

Attempting to drag Kathleen in as a third party witness seems a pretty clear form of intimidation, given that she possesses no special third-party knowledge. Is this the future of niche-market blogging?

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Owner of Neurodiversity.com Subpoenaed in Autism Suit.