Principia Scientific International Backs OMSJ in Court Defamation Claim
Principia Scientific International’s affiliated organisation (OMSJ) once again is compelled to show it has legal teeth by going to trial to put a halt to ongoing defamation and business disparagement.
The Office of Medical and Scientific Justice (OMSJ) reports the matter as follows:
OMSJ Files Trademark Complaint Against AIDS Activist
(September 11, 2013, Austin, Texas) A Texas federal judge has set a January 2015 trial date in the case of OMSJ v. DeShong. The federal lawsuit brought by Clark Baker, founder of the Office of Medical & Scientific Justice (OMSJ), seeks to halt ongoing defamation and business disparagement by Jeffrey Todd DeShong, a Ft. Worth AIDS activist and blogger and to abate DeShong’s use of Plaintiffs’ federally protected trademark.
A non-profit investigative agency, OMSJ provides medical, scientific, and legal support to the defense of those charged with criminal or civil offenses related to HIV and other diseases. OMSJ has been involved in more than 100 cases – many that are still active. Of the cases now closed, more than fifty have resulted in acquittal, favorable plea bargains, or the complete dismissal of HIV-related charges.
The lawsuit alleges that DeShong, 49, has spent the last five years posting defamatory emails and blogs under numerous fictitious names in an attempt to silence Baker and disrupt OMSJ’s business effort under the guise of exercising First Amendment freedom of speech rights. The suit claims that in 2009 DeShong directed his improper attacks at OMSJ’sHIV Innocence Group, which has successfully defended dozens of men and women who were accused of HIV-transmission crimes. Currently 32 states, the military, and two U.S. territories have laws that criminalize the intentional exposure of HIV to another person, even if the retrovirus is not actually transmitted.
On September 5, OMSJ filed its First Amended Complaint, along with Responses to the Defendant’s FRCP 12 (b) (6) and Anti-SLAPP motions to dismiss. A federal judge is now reviewing the motions and has set the trial for January 2015.
The amended complaint and responses can be found at:
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