Ride the Lightning

Lawyer Charged With Directing Cyberattacks Against Review Sites

July 26, 2018

This story was reported on July 23^rd by The American Lawyer and you must click on the link if just for the extraordinary photo of the lawyer on a bull – which might be fitting once you read the story.

The U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Kansas announced the indictment on July 17th of Brad Pistotnik, a personal injury lawyer in Wichita who uses the nickname "The Bull" in connection with his TV ad (and is frequently found posing on bulls). The indictment charges Pistotnik, 62, and computer software engineer David Dorsett, 36, with five counts each of computer fraud and two counts each of conspiracy.

"A Wichita lawyer and a computer software engineer were charged today in a federal indictment alleging they were responsible for cyberattacks on websites that posted information critical of the lawyer's work," U.S. Attorney Stephen McAllister said in a statement announcing the indictment.

The two men are accused of conspiring between September 2014 and July 2015 to carry out cyberattacks on the review websites Leagle.com and Ripoffreport.com, as well as the website of a Phoenix-based law firm, Jaburg Wilk, according to the U.S. attorney's statement. The indictment alleges Dorsett filled the websites' inboxes with threats. Jaburg Wilk has reportedly represented the RipoffReport website.

According to the U.S. Attorney's Office, one of the alleged threatening emails, to Leagle.com, read: "Remove this page and we stop" and "if you don't remove it we will begin targeting your advertisers and explain that this will stop happening to them once they pull their ads from leagle.com or leagle.com kills this page."

Pistotnik is further charged with three counts of lying to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, according to the office of Kansas. Those charges grew out of the personal injury lawyer's responses to questions regarding the timing of the alleged cyberattacks and what Pistotnik knew about them.

The federal prosecutor's office said, for instance, that Pistotnik initially told investigators that Dorsett approached him about a negative review on Ripoffreport.com and offered to have the negative post removed. In reality, according to prosecutors, Pistotnik was the one who contacted Dorsett about the negative report and sought advice on how to remove it.

"Pistotnik claimed that it was a week after Dorsett told him the negative posting had been removed that an attorney for Ripoffreport.com contacted him," the U.S. Attorney's Office said, describing another alleged false statement to the FBI by Pistotnik. "In fact, the company's attorney contacted Pistotnik during the attack and before Pistotnik paid Dorsett for his services."

The computer fraud charges in Pistotnik's indictment carry penalties of up to five years in prison, while the conspiracy charges carry a penalty of up to 10 years in prison, according to the federal prosecutor's office. The false statement charges also carry a potential penalty of five years' imprisonment.

Prior to the criminal case, Pistotnik was probably best known in the Wichita area for advertising his services using the nickname "The Bull," and for appearing in television commercials riding a live bull.

In one such ad, Pistotnik says, "This ain't my first rodeo. I'll hogtie that greedy insurance company into paying you the money you really deserve."

If the allegations prove to be true, Pistotnik may have ridden in his last rodeo. Filing this one away for my "Ethical Misadventures of Lawyers" presentation.

Hat tip to Dee Norman.

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