Actually, it seems that there are many, many examples of the AFA's 'activities' available online - I ran a Google search and read through a couple, but this one sums up the group quite nicely: AFA exposed

It seems that this is the group behind the failed Disney boycott. They had a fun time writing some really nice stuff on the petition- some of the stuff was beyond offensive, and there were quite a few that threatened violence to gays. These are not nice people- they are dangerous.

For those who want to watch such things,

AFA also recently pulled their deposits from Wells Fargo Bank after the bank met their demands with a hearty "bite me." According to today's Chronicles the AFA's vice president said they moved their money to First National Bank of Omaha and "[f]rom our disucssions with their executives, we were satisfied that they would not do what Wells Fargo did." What Wells Fargo did was give $50,000 to GLAAD. So it looks like another case where AFA met with a company's executive and reached an agreement to deny money to third parties. You might also want to watch and see if FNBO continues its support of Youth Emergency Services in Omaha which provides assistance to troubles teens, including programs for gay youths.

I don't know if what the AFA did is illegal and I don't think it should be illegal even if they did what iSm says would be illegal. But more power to you if you can convince Ford to change their mind.

The key is relevence to the claim, but a Company can claim that the information is privilaged in some fashion. Usually the claim is that it is a trade secret and would give competitors an unfair business advantage if disclosed - but sometimes courts don't buy that. The better claim is attorney-client privilage, in which the defendants claim the meeting was a discussion with counsel.

Yes, the privilege generally has to be attorney-client, or attorney work product. Trade secrets doesn't cut it. And any litigant has a right to such non-privileged discovery right from the get-go, without any by-your-leave from the court (though the court is almost always necessary to get at the really juicy stuff that one side does not want to disclose)

Alex is right that it would be helpful to any lawsuit if the AFA gained financially by interfering between Ford and The Advocate, but it's not stricly necessary.

Oh, and pulling their own funds from a bank is not any kind of interference with that bank. Different animal altogether.

I wasn't trying to suggest that they interefered with Wells Fargo by pulling their funds, but perhaps they interefered with unknown gay organizations by reaching an agreement with FNBO, particularly if FNBO now pulls their historical funding of YES-Omaha.

It seems to be the same deal as with Ford. "Stop spending money for the queers and you can have our business."


Thanks for the answer on discovery. What is the first step in the process when a judge has the opportunity to dismiss a civil lawsuit as without merit?

I had just just exclaim the joy I felt with first reading this sentence. Bless you Wells Fargo - and I didn't think I'd EVER say that!

Focus on the Family severed ties with Wells Fargo, not the AFA.
Source

Whoops, you're right. The article I read was talking about the Ford thing and then switched to this. I didn't notice the organization involved changed with it. Anyway, my head's up still applies, just with a different group.

Interesting news from sfgate.com:
Source

Just to catch up with Zlick's legal primer, the first opportunity that a party being sued has to have the case thrown out is when they must answer the lawsuit (within 20 days of being served, if the plaintiff makes the proverbial federal case out of it) with what's called - with a straight face no less - a Demurrer. It sounds as if the defendant is simply too shy to answer the charges, but it means that they want the court to notice that the plaintiff does not have a case.

Most demurrers do not succeed. If there are defects in the plaintiff's allegations of their initial complaint, they are usually given leave by the court to amend that complaint to fix such defects. Rarely is a case just thrown out, because it's very rare that attorneys file a complaint that is insufficient on its face to allege a cause or causes of action against the defendant.


The next chance the defendant has to have the case disposed of is to make a motion for a summary judgment, in which the actual merits of the case are considered and not merely the allegations. This, however, is almost always done by the plaintiff - believing they have a slam-dunk case - and very rarely by a defendant trying to prove there's no valid case against them.


If both of these things go south for the defendant, they can look forward to about a year and half of discovery battles, and depositions ... and a trial at the end of that almost two year process.






Then, the appeals begin. And big cases can usually see swift justice resolve the matter in about a decade.