ACS:Law's Andrew Crossley to 'sue the Internet' over emotional distress claims

LIVE FROM THE ACS:NEWS FRONT DESK, LONDON

News is breaking this hour to word that ACS:Law's defeated henchman Andrew Crossley is planning to once again take on his biggest enemy; the very Internet he exploited for his own financial gain.

Hi5 are notorious for their targeted-at-simpletons approach to advertising

Crossley, fresh from his firms court appearance yesterday, has enlisted the help of accident and injury law firm 'Hi5' who are known in the UK for their "had an accident in the past three years?" daytime television advertisements - screenings that have been under close eye by industry regulator OFCOM after complaints of misleading gluttony.

Hi5 is operated by UK-based lawyers Jonathan Miller and Terence Tsang who, according to a statement issued by Hi5, have 'little to no' connection to ACS:Law.

Crossley claims to have undergone an 'untold' amount of stress and anxiety after his website was taken down by cyber-protestors, his email database 'hacked' (leaked by his own firm) and after numerous death and terror threats against him. This, coupled with numerous investigations by the SRA and industry watchdogs seems to have pushed him over the edge.

"I have ceased my work... I have been subject to criminal attack," he said via his barrister to the BBC.

"My emails have been hacked. I have had death threats and bomb threats," Mr Crossley's statement said.

"They've threatened my family, my wife," he exclaimed.  When questioned to whether or not Mr. Crossley was still in contact with his wife he sneered and said "no comment."

The email leak back in September revealed that not only had Andrew's wife left him but Andrew himself carried a huge degree of frustration and resentment towards her and her new partner.

From: andrew.crossley@acs-law.co.uk
To: <removed.for.protection>

You are f***ing joke. Happy? You? With Kevin the drug addled hermit who has nothing to do with you or his family. You are the saddest person I have ever met.

Now get the f*** away from me forever you complete washed up drug addict loser.

Your email has been marked as blocked sender. No further emails from you will be received by me. Do not ever attempt any form of contact with me again as long as you live.

F*** off and keep out of my life.

Andrew your ex husband of 14 years

The leak of this email casts shadows over the validity of the alleged threats against Mr. Crossley's family, a family which appears to consist of little more than profit-orientated associates and large properties based in leafy West Sussex bought via his legally-grey letter sending business.

Crossley fails to address the on-going investigations against his law firm and its 'mind blowing' contempt of the legal system in the eyes of a judge.  For somebody who shrugged an attack on his website off as "typical rubbish from pirates" it strikes us as rather odd that an alleged set of death threats, most likely originating from kids in the US with access to Skype, if anywhere at all, could bring down his entire firm.

When quizzed to who Mr. Crossley plans on bringing legal proceedings against, he stated via his barrister "Pirates. F***ing pirates... The same ones who took my site down and hacked my emails... I know who they are and they will be seeing me soon."

Hi5 and Mr. Crossley declined to give further details of where they obtained the information of the accused pirates.

Perhaps Andrew is relating a little to what the recipients of his letters have stated after being targeted by his firm, excerpts below (thanks Slyck forums) --

"..these accusations are ruining our life as well as causing serious harm to my partner. My partner is disabled and has many health issues so for that fact alone it is devastating for us both.....

...I immediately called my 18 year old son down and started shouting at him....he's in the middle of his A levels at the moment and is really scared which is the last thing he needs at this time of stress.....

....I worry that the only way I can prove it is to take on a very expensive court case. In the meantime I feel smeared, and have to endure lectures from ACS like I was a criminal.....

.....I was trembling, felt light-headed and completely crushed.......It made me feel like a criminal even though I felt sure I had not done anything wrong.....

....My stress levels really started to rise because I did not have a clue where to start on defending myself.....

...My hands were shaking and I felt sick. My heart was racing. What was this all about?...I got myself into such a state...

... she is now convinced that she is going to jail....

...I feel like a criminal....

....nausea, shock, numbness, heart racing, confusion, distress, you name it, I felt it..

...The worry and stress about this has affected the health of myself and my family...

....The effect of this on my health has been devastating: weight loss and sleepless nights. I have even harboured thoughts of suicide on numerous occasions...."

More on this story as it unfolds...

BREAKING NEWS: ACS-Law blasted off the net, again

ACS:NEWS LIVE AT BREAKFAST

It's been almost a month since the initial takedown of ACS:Law's website, leading to one of the biggest data leaks in UK history.  The firms owner and registered solicitor scumbag, Andrew Crossley, is now churning out so-called 'legal' letters at a ridiculous pace in an attempt to scare as much money out of the UK public as he can before the inevitable.

In what's been dubbed a 'drive by' DDoS attack, ACS-LAW.CO.UK has once again been obliterated and taken offline by activists attempting to bring media attention to the tactics used by these law firms to generate revenue under the guise of 'copyright protection'.

The site went offline yesterday evening, GMT, and remains offline this morning.  Sometime during the night the site was removed all together and is now directing to a 'parked' page with little evidence of the scam left on the domain.  Before being knocked offline, ACS-Law appeared to be attempting a full comeback, finally updating their pathetically unprofessional MySpace-esque website with contact links and even, ironically, a home page link to the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA).

A search for ACS Law on Google, Bing or similar search engines now exposes the truth about the rogue law firm with the official site hidden away somewhere in the pages and pages of news about the catastrophic email leak.

If you've received a letter post September 24th - keep everybody updated by joining the official ACS-Law thread on Slyck and in turn gaining mountains of helpful advice.

The Internet was exploited by ACS-Law for profit.  That same Internet, our Internet, is to be its biggest downfall.

UPDATE:  Our reporters' attempts at contacting Andrew Crossley's mobile phone about his website, directly, have been met with a 'number not in service' tone.  You can contact ACS-Law's offices directly on 02071932493 in the UK or 442071932493 internationally and leave a message.

ACS:Law - 2 weeks on and STILL threatening the UK public, what can we do?

A SPECIAL REPORT FROM ACS:NEWS HEADQUARTERS, LONDON

It has been exactly two weeks since the castrosptropic email leak at notorious 'legalised scam' law firm ACS:Law.  Many, both inside and outside the legal circle believed this would strike the end of the rogue firm and finally put their 'get rich quick' scheme to bed.

Unbelievably 14 days later people are still reporting being harassed by Andrew Crossley for ridiculous sums of between £495 and over £1000.  A post today by Slyck user 'ANGRYMAN' states that he has just received a second letter from ACS telling him to pay up or face ficticious court fines, suggesting that ACS:Law are still in operation.

"Okay Ive been following this thread for some while now as I am one of the many who has been wrongly accused. I got my second letter just now after my first lod had been refused as they say it was a template letter. Utter nonsense as I added half the words to the lod myself. I just copied the paragraph with the law acts involving the CDPA Act 1988 as I am no professional in the law. This letter that I have just received says if I do not pay the £495 within 14 days of receiving this 2nd letter then they will apply to the court for an immediate interim payment of £1000 towards their legal costs. What is this all about. Im innocent , can they do this, get money from you before you even go to court. Its outrageous. This ACS law company are really pushing it now. Threatening people with £1000 up front interim payments before you get taken to court surely cant be right. These people will not intimidate me. Ive not done it. Demanding up front legal costs by a court order before you go to court to cover their costs, whats that all about???" - ANGRYMAN, Slyck forums

As per usual, the helpful crew at Slyck, a forum ACS:Law previously attempted to shut down, jump on board to express their knowledge:

"ACS have been picked up on their lack of transparency re costs and fees before. They'll have plucked the £1000 (too round a figure to be real) out of thin air and would probably attribute it to the cost of sending their letters and other admin (LOL).
In reality the 1K has no other basis other than as an additional scare tactic." - Time on my hands, Slyck forums

"Don't worry about it, as far as I know this threat has no legal basis, as Time on my hands says, it's a scare tactic. A court cannot (will not?) award costs to someone on the basis of an accusation. The only way for this to happen (as far as I'm aware) is to have a trial and one side to be found guilty, and we all know that's not going to happen." - shufferin'shuccotash, Slyck forums

Could ACS:Law be attempting to milk as much from innocent people in what could be the final weeks of their existence?  It seems they're wasting absolutely no time sending out their usual hogwash to the masses that have previously sent ACS letters of denial.  [EDIT: PI guru Alexander Hanff explains why ACS cannot reject a LoD]

So, what can we do to help put the final nails in the coffin of Andrew Crossley and his team of currently legalised scammers?

Education is key here and what will be most feared by ACS:Law.  This is a firm built on taking advantage of the good, non-confrontational nature of most people, relying heavily, if not solely, on being able to bully via a suite and a letterhead.

A Google search for the law firm now suggests 'scam' as a search phrase, 'leak' as another and lists hundreds of results enlightening those who have fallen victim to an ACS letter to the foul nature of the firms existence.

Let's outline a few things that we, the average internet user, can do to ensure the demise of ACS:Law:

• Don't stop informing people, the media and any contacts you may have about ACS:Law's operation and the leak.  Perhaps Crossley thinks that in time the chaos caused by the email leaks will 'die down', let's not allow that to happen.

• Contact the new 'Legal Ombudsman' and the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) who, according to reports, are currently receiving hundreds if not thousands of complaints.  If you've received a letter then use this to your advantage, get in contact with the SRA and add to the numbers.

• Get in contact with Privacy International who are building a case against ACS:Law.  This is especially important if you have been one of the thousands of people who's data has been exposed by Andrew Crossley.

• Contact your ISP today and ask them what they are doing to combat these 'IP collection' scams.  UK ISP Xilo has just stated that they WILL NOT hand over any customer data to the likes of ACS and strongly believe that IP collection methods are flawed and hold no real evidence to a case of copyright infringement.  Put pressure on your ISP to release a similar statement - remember BT and Plusnet are now rethinking giving data over so easily.  Let them know that the privacy of their paying customers should be a huge priority and if they cannot prove their will to protect you, you'll be going elsewhere.

• Avoid or download the content 'forbidden' by ACS:Law - the choice is yours.  If you don't want a letter, Slyck has compiled a list of the content UK users should avoid sharing on public networks like BitTorrent.  All other users are immune though, and if you're worried you can still download it all, anyway, via the web.
  

Yesterday news broke to the taking down of three Spanish anti-P2P groups - SGAE.es, MCU.es and Promusicase.es by Anonymous, the collective term for nameless internet users using the power of Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks as a means of protest.  Think of it as the online equivalant of standing outside of ACS:Law's offices with masks and banners, disrupting their business whilst bringing mass media attention.  The news was covered throughout Spain on national TV stations, radio and of course online.
As yet more 'get rich quick on the Internet' hopefuls jump on the 'sue 'em all' bandwagon, it seems as though there is no shortage of potential targets for Anonymous as the battle for online freedom continues...