Friday, Jun 22, 2012    Text size: 

LAS VEGAS — A federal judge today sided with gay adult studio Corbin Fisher and has issued a temporary restraining order against file-locker site Oron.com, effectively freezing all assets of the company.

Corbin Fisher on Wednesday filed a $34.8 million copyright infringement against Oron and its operators, claiming they had knowledge and induced the trading of pirated porn on its site. The suit alleges at least 232 infringements on the site

"Plaintiff has demonstrated that defendants are engaged in allegedly fraudulent transfers that may impinge on the court’s ability to issue effective equitable relief," said the order signed by U.S. District Judge Gloria Navarro.

Named in the suit is parent company FF Magnat Ltd. and owner Maxim Bochenko, who also goes by the name Roman Romanov, as well as 500 John Does

With Navarro's order, all bank accounts held by FF Magnat, Oron.com and Bochenko have been frozen until a hearing slated for July 3.

PayPal, AlertPay and CCBill also have been ordered to freeze all Oron accounts, and VeriSign has been ordered to freeze the Oron.com domain name from any transfers.

"All defendants are hereby enjoined from disgorging or dissipating any funds, property, domain names, or other assets until further notice," Navarro said.

Concurrently, Corbin Fisher served Oron's parent company in Hong Kong, FF Magnat Ltd., with a legally binding injunction prohibiting disposal of assets in Hong Kong.

In the Hong Kong order, Oron operators have been enjoined from disposing or diminishing in value of its assets up to $3 million.

The Hong Kong High Court order, in effect until July 6, also freezes assets in an HSBC bank account, as well as others.

In the suit filed at U.S. District Court in Las Vegas, Corbin Fisher seeks impoundment of infringing content and damages, as well as attorneys fees.

Attorney Marc Randazza, who represents Corbin Fisher, told XBIZ that his firm worked with Porn Guardian for about a year to set up the case.  

"The evidence packages they gave us enabled us to use accounting, physical downloads and screenshots as a significant cornerstone of our case," Randazza said. "Moreover, because their solution relies on human categorization of the piracy they find online, there is no question about the accuracy of the infringements they found.  

"It really helps that Porn Guardian gave us a view of how huge the Oron problem was for so many companies in the industry. The bird's eye view they have casts a much stronger light on the magnitude of the problem."  

UPDATED (June 25, 11:30 a.m.):

Defendants have been ordered to preserve evidence and not permitted to toss any information that appears "reasonably calculated to lead to discovery" of admissible evidence.

The court specifically noted communications with Network Solutions, Yahoo, Google, CCBill, AlertPay and other accounts.

"Defendants shall restore any business records that they have deleted since the time that negotiations between plaintiff and defendants commenced on May 30, 2012," the order said.