Florida resident Jack Arons blamed Dallas attorney Larry Friedman for a breakdown in lawsuit-settlement negotiations, saying Friedman did not take the negotiations seriously.
In court filings in which Friedman is seeking a new temporary restraining order against Arons that would prohibit Arons from communicating with reporters and other third parties about the case, Friedman said talks collapsed because Arons didn’t negotiate in good faith.
A previous restraining order against Arons expired.
Friedman’s is not telling the truth, Arons said.
“It is more like Larry was unwilling to mediate,” Arons said in a Blog Comment here. “I had set aside 4 hours on the day of mediation to mediate and Larry who was in his car on the way to another meeting spent all of 15 minutes on the mediation.
“He also continued to load me down with paperwork during the so called mediation. So as is the case Larry is lying again and is making it sound like I am at fault and not him,” Arons said.
Friedman sued Arons last month in Dallas for slander and libel, in a case that sprouted from Friedman’s representation of the ASD Members Business Association (ASDMBA) Trust.
The Trust was formed by member contributions to protect their legal interests in the AdSurfDaily Ponzi scheme case. Some ASDMBA members have complained about the management of the Trust by Bob Guenther, its de facto head.
Guenther, they say, has not provided transparent accounting that detailed how the Trust spent money from contributors. Friedman is the Trust’s attorney. Guenther, a convicted felon, introduced Friedman to potential contributors last year.
Arons, who says Friedman has buried him in paperwork, including a 135-page filing yesterday, lives in a manufactured home in Florida, collects Social Security and does not have an attorney.
Arons now is trying to amass $1,500 through a loan or donations to sue Friedman in federal court.
Yesterday’s filing by Friedman includes an exhibit of Internet postings on this Blog and the ASD-Biz forum. It also includes content from the websites of the Dallas Morning News and WCTV-TV, a Florida television station.
Separately, Friedman is using a subpoena to ning.com, the host of the ASD-Biz forum, in a bid to obtain information on posters at the forum. Some forum members appear to have changed their forum identities to create twists on their old names or twists on how they’ve been described by Guenther — in protest.
Guenther is scheduled to make a court appearance in Arizona today on felony charges of repeatedly violating a court order that prohibited him from threatening an Arizona company.