THE SPIRIT OF THE MIKE PORTNOY VS. DREAM THEATER LAWSUIT CARRIES ON

On September 20th we reported that Mike Portnoy sued the other members of Dream Theater back in April, linking to the publicly available “Notice of Summons” document as proof. Later that day Dream Theater’s attorney was quoted as saying there is “no pending litigation” between Portnoy and Dream Theater. Today I choose to file a motion of “bullshit.”

A stealthy MetalSucks named Larry W. reader tipped us off to the existence of this website, a publicly searchable database of all court records in New York state. Pass the captcha, type “Portnoy, Mike” into the Plaintiff Search box (lol at him not using “Michael”), and voila, a plethora of documents relating to the Portnoy vs. DT litigation, the most recent of which was filed YESTERDAY.

There’s a bunch of documents there and you’re busy, so I’ll sum it all up for you: from what I can gather, other than the very first document, all of this stuff boils down to a request to have Portnoy’s and all the members of Dream Theater’s addresses removed from public record, since, ya know, they’d probably like to avoid stalkers. What makes no sense is why the document with their addresses would still be posted, and why they’d even bother with all of this if there is, in fact, no pending litigation. Either it’s some kind of formality to close up a loose end, or Dream Theater’s lawyer quoted above was blowing smoke up our asses.

If there are any lawyers in the MS readership, feel free to speculate in the comments or via email.

-VN