Despite the recent scramble by search engines Google and Yahoo! to pull gambling advertising content from their sites, both have been named along with various other companies, as plaintiffs in a class-action lawsuit recently filed in San Francisco Superior Court.
The suit, brought by California residents Mario Cisneros, who allegedly never engaged in any Internet gambling, and Michael Voight, who claims to have used search engines in California to find gambling sites and lost $100,000, specifically names 13 Defendants, and 100 "John Doe" defendants.
The plaintiffs are seeking monetary relief and to enjoin the Defendants from "participating in, and continuing to market, sell, and display advertising for illegal Internet gambling establishments." The class sought to be certified in the suit is defined as "All California residents who visited an illegal Internet gambling website and incurred losses therein each found these websites as a result of advertisements contained on Defendants and their affiliates web pages or search results."
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Lawrence G. Walters is a partner with the national firm of Weston, Garrou, DeWitt & Walters, with offices in Orlando, Los Angeles and San Diego. The firm practices in the area of Free Speech regulation, Internet law, Gaming law and Advertising issues. Nothing in this article is intended as legal advice. Please consult with your personal attorney on specific legal issues.
You can reach Lawrence Walters at: Larry@LawrenceWalters.com,
www.GameAttorneys.com or AOL Screen Name, "Webattorney."