David Springer's Questionable Business Methods Cited by Judge in Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law

by Structured Settlement Watchdog®

 

It has been a 4 year journey that began when  I broke the story about the webuypayments.net redirect scheme in July 2011, that has recently resulted in both a monetary judgment and a permanent injunction against David Springer, a 48 year old Mount Airy Maryland resident and former structured settlement factoring broker.

 

Judge Issued Liability Decision Against David Springer of Mt Airy MD in March 2015

On March 30, 2015, Maryland Federal Judge Marvin Garbis issued his decision against Springer and in favor of Woodbridge Structured Funding. On April 29, 2015 Judge Garbis issued his findings of fact and conclusions of law.

Download Woodbridge v Springer Supplemental Bench Trial Decision 4-29-2015

 

Judge Garbis' words speak for themselves in this excerpt from the decision in Woodbridge Structured Funding, LLC v. Springer:  

 

"In or about 2003, Springer began operating a sole proprietorship in the structured settlement business under the Sovereign name.

 

By the fall of 2011 and continuing thereafter, Springer had utilized and/or was using questionable business methods, including:

• Falsely claiming that Sovereign was a corporation.
• Misrepresenting (in various contexts, including sites such as Facebook and
  LinkedIn and to the Better Business Bureau) Sovereign as a corporation, and misrepresenting as real persons who were officers of Sovereign, fictitious persons created by Springer.
• Falsely claiming that Sovereign itself was a purchaser of structured settlements rather than merely a broker.
• Utilizing the website with the address www.webuypayments.net and other websites anonymously connected to it to redirect Internet inquiries intended for competitors to the Sovereign website.  [ in the footnote the court acknowledged that David Springer denied that he owned or controlled the websites utilized in Internet redirects to webuypayments.net. The registrations of these domains are “private” and anonymous. However, based upon its evaluation of Springer’s testimony and the fact that the beneficiary of the redirects was Springer, the Court finds that Springer owned, or at least controlled, these websites]"

The Maryland District Court found that "at some time prior to October 2011, Woodbridge became aware that Springer was (1) utilizing the www.webuypayments.net website to redirect to his own Sovereign website Internet users who would otherwise have been connected with Woodbridge, and (2) using deceptive search engine optimization (“SEO”) techniques that resulted in search engine results combining Woodbridge’s name with derogatory terms such as “funding lie,” “funding scam,” and “funding complaint.”

In October 2011, Woodbridge sent a cease and desist letter to Springer at Sovereign regarding the redirection of Internet “hits” from Woodbridge and the inclusion of terms derogatory to Woodbridge in search engine results. Springer did not respond to Woodbridge, but he “parked” the www.webuypayments.net website and had the search engine redirects no longer directed to the Sovereign websites.Nevertheless, he continued to have potential customers directed away from Woodbridge and to cause search engines results to combine Woodbridge’s name with derogatory terms.  The redirects were sent to other sites – for example, a blog of a person against whom he had a grudge* and to blank pages on www.wikipedia.org.

* (was actually sent to our main site, not the blog)

 *  the extent to which Springer had a grudge might be able to be demonstrated by connecting the dots.

Those of my readers who remember the defamation campaign against me in 2012. 

Darer v Does

I filed a John Doe lawsuit captioned John Darer v John Does 1-25 in the United States District Court District of Connecticut 3:12-cv-00383-JCH on March 14, 2012.

John Darer v PPC Ltd, Private Protection Co , LTD and Gary Brown WIPO Arbitration

In the matter of John Darer v PPC Ltd., Private Protection Co. LTD and Gary Brown WIP Arbitration and Mediation Center Case No. D2012-2032 decided December 10, 2012 regarding the identity of the Respondent,  the Panelist " finds that the facts of this case support a finding that the Disputed Domain names were more likely than not controlled by the same person/entity", citing among other things:

at 5(iv) "the Complainant submitted affidavit evidence to the effect that he was the plaintiff in John Darer v. John Does 1-25 d/b/a johndarer.com, johndarer.net and johndarer.org**, Case No. 3:12-cv-00383-JCH, (commenced in the US District Court for the District of Connecticut on March 14, 2012 and closed without prejudice to renewal on September 25, 2012), where it was revealed during discovery that the same email address was previously used in connection with the registration and/or operation of each of the Disputed Domain Names. Further, in response to subpoenas in such proceedings, internet service providers and IP anonymiser services utilized in connection with the Disputed Domain Names informed the Complainant that the IP addresses used to register and/or operate the Disputed Domain Names previously pointed towards one individual/entity".

In a September 14, 2012 motion filed by Plaintiff in the Darer v Does case (Document 18 page 2) it states:

"Pursuant to the Court’s Order, the Plaintiff engaged in certain third party discovery in an effort to identify the defendants at issue in this litigation. The nature of the information uncovered suggested that defendants had been purposefully concealing their true identities and employing significant technological means to do so. Despite these efforts, the Plaintiff obtained evidence of certain Internet Protocol (“IP”) addresses and other information utilized by the John Doe defendants allegedly involved in the activity at issue in this litigation and traced that information through multiple layers of service providers and internet companies. The Plaintiff believed he had identified at least two (2) of the John Doe defendants (David and Melissa Springer), and had contacted those individuals regarding this litigation..."

In certain testimony given by Springer as Defendant in the Woodbridge lawsuit trial, he uses turns of phrases that appeared in those 2012 postings.

David Springer was also sued by JG Wentworth in 2011 over similar claims that were alleged in the Woodbridge case, stemming from actions alleged from early 2011.To wit...

"Defendants published false and defamatory statements J.G. Wentworth on websites that they operated, including the jgw-scam site, the jgw-sucks site, and the scam-related sites.The statements published by Defendants portray J.G.Wentworth in a negative light and discourage potential customers from doing business with J.G. Wentworth. Among other false and defamatory statements, Defendants published statements accusing J.G. Wentworth of being “guilty” of criminal conduct, “fraud, misrepresentation and practices that were oppressive and unconscionable,” “deceptive marketing practices,” being liars, and that the company is a “scam.”  [ see Springer v Erie Insurance Group Appeal decided June 2014] That case settled in March 2012. 

Springer believed and communicated to others that I was the root cause of all his troubles, (because I uncovered the webuypayments scheme). Now a federal judge in the state where David Springer and his family live,  having heard the evidence and testimony at trial in August 2014, has determined "that Springer owned, or at least controlled, these websites" in question in the Woodbridge litigation.

How would a structured settlement consumer know without going to the depth of research and legal expense that JG Wentworth, Woodbridge and I have, that Springer and his "purported entity" Sovereign Funding Group engaged in these practices?

I have not always been in agreement with Woodbridge, but in this case Robert Shapiro, the owner of Woodbridge Structured Funding deserves credit for his perseverance, for over more than 3 1/2 years, to help do what even JG Wentworth and others affected by the webuypayments.net scheme could not do. The structured settlement secondary market has been plagued by scam, sucks and rip off marketing and brandjacking for too long. It's one thing to debate issues that you disagree with, it's another thing to make things up.

Note

** the respective domains at issue in the Darer vs John Does case were subsequently acquired at auction in 2013 and 2014 are now under the control of John Darer who holds the trademark.