Libel is not libel if you are spreading the truth.

Unfortunately you will have to go to court and have a jury/judge decide whether you are telling the truth or not in the posts/complaints they are targeting as "libel".

Let's just hope they are just trying to scare you and not really pursuing a law suit. This is very possible. Hopefully they will not pursue it. If they are scammers, they will not sue you most likely, but that is not even 100% true anyway. Just most likley. If you lose, you will lose out big time because you will owe them money for damage to their reputation and you still have to pay your lawyer. If you do not have the money (if you lose), they will have it taken little by little out of your paycheck.

You will lose out financially even if you win as you will need to pay a lawyer. That will be expensive as you need to get a good lawyer and they do not come cheap. If you get a cheap lawyer, plan on losing. That's the way of the good ole US justice system. Love it or leave it.

Hopefully this will all pass with no law suit. The laws are written for the most part to bebfit crooks so there is a good chance you'll lose out, but keep your chin up.

P. Drammel

> Hi,

> It sounds very strange, but it's happening - to me!
> August last year, I bought something from an eBayer, who then offered to
> sell me some other things. Being a little ignorant of what was really
> happening, I agreed. We were emailing back and forth almost every day,
> when eventually, I also agreed to a website being built.

> It ended up costing me just under US$10K, which was close to half my
> income at the time. Being naive, I agreed when these people insisted that
> I pay via Telegraphic Transfer. This was back in September last year.

> Almost as soon as I paid them the money, they started to ignore my emails.
> It would sometimes take them a couple of weeks to get back to me. Also, I
> noticed that they had sent me hardly anything. Just a couple of packages -
> only a small part of what they were suppossed to send.

> They had repeatedy told me that further packages would be sent
> "tommorrow". However, this didn't turn out to be the case.

> I started to get suspicious when they stopped responding to my emails, and
> so I checked their eBay account for further activity. It was closed. I
> called the number they gave me. It was disconnected.

> I called the police in their local area, and they did some digging.
> Apparently the business name they were fronting is not registered, and
> they have a criminal record.

> All these things pretty much confirmed for me that I had been scammed. I
> posted about it in a well respected forum.

> Anyway, they did email back to me, but it was just to inform me that they
> had moved, and had a new address. This was back in late January. They told
> me that my items were going out soon.

> I gave them a week, and when I didn't recieve anything, I filed a Rip Off
> Report on them. I was basically telling people to stay away from these
> guys, and admittedly I might have gone over the top, and called them
> outright scam artists. However, in my defence, I believed it to be true -
> I had been ripped off a lot of money.

> Anyway, discussions between us have become less cordial, with me losing my
> patience, and them trying to avoid responsibility for what has happened.

> I still haven't recieved anything further from them (packages or website).
> However, I have recieved an email from them recently stating that they had
> read my posts on the forum, and the Rip Off Report (which incidently they
> had just discoevered) and now plan to sue me for 'libel' loss of potential
> business.

> Oh yeah, one other thing. They've now decided they're going to send the
> packages (probably so they don't look like total fools, when they present
> their case).

> These people have mislead me, taken my money, and just now have found
> another way to possibly squeeze more money out of me. I know that
> apparently their merchant facilities were closed down by the bank, and so
> they were short of funds (that was the excuse they used for not sending me
> my items earlier this year).

> They've given me the name of the law firm they will be using, and stated
> that there will be no further communications between us. They informed me
> that they will also be moving out of the state.

> What should I do? I know they might have a case against me, however what I
> said at the time in the report appeared to be true (and I still believe
> this might be the case). Do I have a good defence against this?

> I'm a low income earner, so I really can't afford a legal battle, if
> that's what's to happen.

> John B