Court Rules that a Man Cannot
Sue a Personal Ads Sex Website for
Facilitating His Having Sex with an Underage
Girl
OHIO,
December 30, 2008. Case Background: Plaintiff Doe used the
SexSearch website to
meet Jane Roe, who described herself as an eighteen-year-old
female. The two met and had
sexual relations. Roe, it turned out, was actually
fourteen years old, and Doe was consequently
arrested and charged with three counts of
unlawful sexual conduct with a minor. In an unusual
case of first impression, Doe then
filed suit against SexSearch, alleging an array of violations
under Ohio law, most of
which are variations on the claim that SexSearch is at fault for Doe’s
sexual
relationship with a minor and the harm that resulted from his arrest.
UNITED
STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR
THE SIXTH CIRCUIT
_________________
JOHN
DOE,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
v. SEXSEARCH.COM,
et al., Defendants-Appellees. Case
No. 07-4182
Appeal
from the United States District Court for the Northern
District of Ohio at Toledo.
No.
07-00604—Jack Zouhary, District Judge. Argued: October 24,
2008
Decided
and Filed:
December 30, 2008 Before:
BOGGS, Chief Judge; MERRITT and GRIFFIN, Circuit Judges.
_________________
COUNSEL
ARGUED:
Dean
Boland, Lakewood, Ohio, for Appellant. Gary J. Kaufman, Pro Hoc Vice,
KAUFMAN
LAW GROUP, Los Angeles, California, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: Dean
Boland, Lakewood,
Ohio, for Appellant. Gary J. Kaufman, Colin A.
Hardacre, Dana S.
Milmeister,
Pro Hoc Vice, KAUFMAN LAW GROUP, Los Angeles, California, Richard
Marvin
Kerger, KERGER & HARTMAN, Toledo, Ohio, for Appellees. Michael B.Bressman,
VANDERBILT LEGAL CLINIC, Nashville, Tennessee, for Amici Curiae.
1
No.
07-4182 John Doe v. SexSearch.com Page 2
_________________
OPINION
_________________
MERRITT,
Circuit Judge. Pseudonymous plaintiff John Doe appeals the
dismissal
of his
complaint against defendant, SexSearch.com (“SexSearch”), an online
adult dating service
that
facilitates sexual encounters between its members. Doe
used SexSearch to meet Jane Roe, who
described herself as an eighteen-year-old female. The two met
and had
sexual
relations. Roe, it
turned out, was actually fourteen years
old, and Doe was
consequently
arrested and charged
with three counts of unlawful sexual conduct with a
minor. In an
unusual case of first impression,
Doe then filed suit against SexSearch, alleging
an array
of violations under Ohio law, most of
which are variations on the claim that
SexSearch
is at fault for Doe’s sexual relationship with a
minor and the harm that resulted
from his
arrest.
The
district court dismissed all fourteen causes
of action under Fed. R. Civ. P.12(b)(6) for failure to
state a claim. In the alternative, the district
court held that eight of the
fourteen
causes of action were also barred by the Communications
Decency Act, 47 U.S.C.
§ 230.
Because we agree with the district court that Doe’s complaint
failed to state a
claim,
we do not reach the question of whether the Communications Decency
Act provides SexSearch with immunity from suit. We do not adopt the district court’s discussion
of the
Act, which would read § 230 more broadly than any previous Court of Appeals
decision
has
read it,
potentially abrogating all state- or common-law causes of
action brought against
interactive
Internet services. We do not have before us any issue
concerning the criminal liability
of the
parties or the voidability of contracts for sexual services.
I.
SexSearch
is an “online adult dating service.” Its members use the
website to meet one another
for sexual
encounters. In October 2005, John Doe became a “Gold Member” of SexSearch,
which
required him to pay $29.95 per month and agree to the site’s Terms and
Conditions,
including a promise on Doe’s behalf that he was at least eighteen years old.
Using the
service,
Doe met Jane Roe, who likewise had become a “Gold Member” after
agreeing
to SexSearch’s
Terms and Conditions and warranting that she was at least eighteen.
In
her profile, she stated that she was born June 15, 1987. After
meeting online, Roe invited
Doe
to her home
on November 15, 2005, at which point they had sexual relations.
At some point
thereafter, Roe, who was actually fourteen, told the police about her
encounter with
Doe. On
December 30, 2005, police surrounded Doe’s home, arrested him,
and
charged him with three
counts of engaging in unlawful sexual conduct with a minor, a
third-degree felony. For reasons
that are unclear, the charges were later dismissed and Doe’s
records
were sealed. Doe claims,
however, that the arrest and prosecution — and the
publicity
that accompanied them — caused
lasting harm to his reputation, family life, and
employment
prospects. Based
on this harm, Doe
filed suit against fifteen corporate and
individual
defendants, whom he believed were the owners
of SexSearch. The complaint contained fourteen causes of action, which, as the district court
noted, “boil down to either
(a)
Defendants failed to discover [that] Jane Roe lied about her age to
join the website,
or (b)
the contract terms are unconscionable.” Doe v. SexSearch.com, 502 F.
Supp. 2d 719, 724
(N.D. Ohio 2007). Defendants
then filed motions to dismiss for lack of
personal
jurisdiction and for failure
to state a claim. For the sake of judicial economy,
defendant/intervenor
Cytek, Ltd.,
which claims to
be the true owner of SexSearch, agreed to
enter an appearance and waive
all issues
related to service of process and personal jurisdiction
so
that the court could consider the
12(b)(6) motion before undertaking the time-consuming task
of evaluating
personal
jurisdiction for each remaining defendant. The
district court granted the
motion to dismiss, concluding that
Doe had failed to state
a claim as to each of the fourteen
causes of action and, in
the alternative, concluding
that many of the
claims were barred by the
Communications Decency Act. This appeal
followed.
II.
We
review the district court’s judgment de novo. Barany-Snyder
v. Weiner, 539 F.3d
327, 332
(6th Cir. 2008). We construe the complaint in the
light most favorable to the
nonmoving party
and
accept all well-pleaded factual allegations as true to determine whether
the moving
party is
entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Commercial Money Ctr.,
Inc.
v. Ill.
Union Ins. Co.,
508 F.3d 327, 336 (6th Cir. 2007). While our analysis primarily focuses on the
complaint, “
matters of public record, orders, items appearing in the record of
the case,
and exhibits attached
to the complaint . . . may be taken into account.” Amini v.
Oberlin
Coll.,
259 F.3d 493, 502
(6th Cir. 2001). As
noted above, we do not adopt the district court’s analysis of
the
Communications Decency Act and
explicitly reserve the question of its scope for another day.
We do, however, affirm the
district court’s decision to dismiss Doe’s complaint for
failure to
state
a claim. Count
One alleges that SexSearch breached its contract with Doe by
permitting
minors to become
members of its service. Under Ohio law, to prove breach of contract, a
plaintiff must
prove that (1) a contract existed; (2) plaintiff fulfilled his obligations; (3)
defendant
failed
to fulfill his obligations; and (4) damages resulted from this failure.
Lawrence v.
Lorian
County Cmty Coll.,
713 N.E.2d 478, 480 (Ohio Ct. App. 1998). A
contract between
Doe and
SexSearch was formed when Doe checked a box indicating that
he was
over eighteen and had
read and agreed to SexSearch’s Terms and Conditions and privacy policy. The
Terms and
Conditions constitute the content of the contract. Doe
alleges
that SexSearch failed to fulfill its
obligations by “permitt[ing] minors to become paid
members”
and by “deliver[ing] a minor to
Plaintiff
for the purpose of sexual relations.”
Compl. ¶¶
296-97, J.A. at 46. But the Terms and
Conditions state that SexSearch “cannot
guarantee,
and assume[s] no responsibility for verifying,
the accuracy of the information
provided
by other users of the Service.” The contract requires
that members be “eighteen or over to
register,” but nowhere does SexSearch promise to prevent
minors from registering
or to
monitor members’ profiles for accuracy. Therefore, the complaint
does not state a
breach-of- contract
claim because Doe has not alleged that SexSearch has
breached
any
promise that is actually part of the contract. Count
Two alleges that SexSearch
fraudulently represented that “all
persons on its site
are ‘18+’ years of age,” and that it “verifies
all members
profiles prior to posting.” Compl.
¶¶ 301, 302, J.A. at 47. This allegation stems from
a warning
on SexSearch stating
that “all persons
within this site are 18+.” To state a claim of
fraud,
plaintiff must allege: (a)
a representation
(b) that is material to the transaction at hand, (c)
made falsely, with
knowledge
of its falsity, (d) with the intent of misleading another into relying
upon it, (e)
justifiable reliance upon the representation or concealment,
and (f) a resulting injury
proximately caused by the reliance. Orbit Elecs., Inc. v.
Helm Instrument Co., 855 N.E.2d
91,
100
(Ohio Ct. App. 2006). The most obvious deficiency comes from the requirement of
justifiable
reliance upon the representation. As noted, the Terms and Conditions expressly
disclaim
responsibility for verifying members’ ages. They also state that no “information, whether oral or
written, obtained by you from SexSearch or through or from [sic] SexSearch
shall
create any
warranty not expressly stated in the TAC.” Furthermore, having registered
for the
site himself,
Doe knew that SexSearch merely required a user to check a box stating
that he or she
is at least
eighteen, with no corroborating evidence required
from the user and
no attempt at verification
made by SexSearch. As a result, there could be no
justifiable reliance on the
warning, and thus
Count Two does not state a claim for
fraudulent representation. Count
Three alleges that
SexSearch negligently inflicted emotional
distress by failing to
remove Roe’s profile from its
website. To state a claim for
negligent infliction of emotional distress
under Ohio law, the plaintiff
must allege that he was aware of
real physical danger to
himself or another. See King v.
Bogner, 624 N.E.2d 364,
367 (Ohio Ct.
App. 1993);
see also Heiner v. Moretuzzo, 652 N.E.2d
664, 669 (Ohio 1995) (Ohio courts
have
limited “recovery for negligent infliction of emotional
distress to instances where the
plaintiff
has either witnessed or experienced a dangerous accident
or appreciated the actual
physical
peril”). Doe’s alleged injuries result from embarrassment and
harm to social
standing
and employment prospects; he does not allege that he experienced a
dangerous
accident
or appreciated actual physical peril and, consequently, has not stated a claim
for
negligent
infliction of emotional distress. See Wigfall v. Society Nat’l Bank, 669 N.E.2d 313
(Ohio Ct.
App. 1995) (affirming trial court’s grant of summary judgment for defendant on
plaintiff’s claim for negligent infliction of emotional distress, where defendant falsely
accused
plaintiff of robbing a bank, resulting in plaintiff’s arrest and interrogation and the
publication of his
photograph). Count
Four alleges negligent misrepresentation based on the warning
that all
members of SexSearch are adults. A defendant is liable for negligent
misrepresentation if
he (1)
supplies false information (2) for the guidance of others in their
business transactions (3) causing
pecuniary
loss to the plaintiff (4) while the plaintiff justifiably
relied upon the
information (5)
and
the defendant failed to exercise reasonable care or competence in
obtaining or
communicating
the information. Delman v. City of Cleveland
Heights,
534
N.E.2d 835, 838
(Ohio 1989).
Courts have also recognized that a claim for negligent
misrepresentation requires “a special
relationship under which the defendant supplied information to the
plaintiff for the latter’s
guidance in its business transaction.” Ziegler v. Findlay Indus.,
Inc.,
464 F. Supp. 2d 733, 738
(N.D. Ohio 2006). The information at issue
in this
case was not supplied to guide others in their
business transactions; nor is Doe
complaining about any pecuniary losses; nor (as noted) was his
reliance justifiable; nor has
he alleged
any “special relationship” between himself and SexSearch.
Therefore he has
failed to
state a claim for negligent misrepresentation. Count
Five alleges a
breach of warranty, likewise based on the same
warning about users being over
eighteen. Under
Ohio Rev. Code § 1302.26,“[a]ny affirmation of
fact
or
promise made by
the seller to the buyer
which relates to the goods and becomes part of the
basis of
the bargain creates an express
warranty that the goods shall conform to the
affirmation or promise.” The section only applies to
the sale
of goods, not to services. See
Brown v.
Christopher Inn Co.,
344 N.E.2d 140 (Ohio Ct. App. 1975) (holding that § 1302.26
does not
apply when there is no sale of goods, as defined by
the Uniform Commercial Code).
Because
SexSearch is a service and Doe has not alleged that
the dispute concerns the sale of goods, he has
not stated a claim for breach of warranty. Counts
Six through Ten allege violations of the Ohio Consumer Sales
Practices Act. Counts Six and
Seven
allege deceptive trade practices in violation of Ohio Rev.
Code § 1345.02. When
determining whether an act or practice is deceptive, the court
views the
incident from the
consumer’s standpoint. Chestnut v. Progressive Cas. Ins.
Co., 850 N.E.2d
751, 757 (Ohio
Ct.
App. 2006). “The basic test is one of fairness; the act need not rise to the
level of
fraud,
negligence, or breach of contract.”
Id. “Furthermore, a
deceptive act has the
likelihood
of
inducing a state of mind in the consumer that is not in accord with the facts.”
Id.
Here,
there was
no likelihood that SexSearch’s warning that all users are over eighteen
would
induce a state of
mind in Doe that was not in accord with the facts. He had agreed to
the Terms
and Conditions,
which state that SexSearch is not responsible for verifying
users’
ages, and
had gone through the
registration process himself and thus
knew that SexSearch took no steps to check
the accuracy
of users’ promises that they are eighteen. Because the
warning was not
deceptive, when viewed
from Doe’s perspective,
Counts
Six and Seven do
not state
a claim for deceptive sales practices.
Counts
Eight through Ten allege unconscionable acts in violation of
Ohio Rev. Code
§ 1345.03,
which states: “No supplier shall commit an unconscionable act or
practice in connection with a
consumer transaction.” Ohio Rev. Code § 1345.03(A). When determining whether an
act is
unconscionable, a court should consider, among other things,
“[w]hether the
supplier required the
consumer to enter into a consumer transaction on terms
the
supplier knew were substantially
one-sided in favor of the supplier.” Id.
§
1345.03(B)(5). The allegedly unconscionable acts at
issue here
are
the
inclusion of: a
clause
limiting damages to the amount of the contract (Count
Eight), a clause allowing
SexSearch
to cancel the contract at any time (Count Nine), and
unspecified clauses that are
substantially one-sided (Count Ten). Limitation-of-liability
clauses
are viewed critically, but may be freely bargained for
in Ohio and will be enforced “‘[a]bsent
important public policy concerns, unconscionability,
or vague
and ambiguous terms.’” Nahra v.
Honeywell, Inc., 892 F. Supp. 962, 969 (N.D.
Ohio 1995)
(quoting Collins v. Click Camera &
Video, Inc., 621 N.E.2d 1294, 1298 (Ohio
Ct. App.
1993). A SexSearch gold membership costs
$29.95 per month. Given the nature of the service,
which encourages members to meet in person
for sexual encounters,
SexSearch’s potential liability is nearly limitless. For example, arrest,
diseases of various
sorts, and
injuries caused by irate family members or others may be the result
of such
hedonistic
sex. When selling such services, then, it is commercially reasonable for
SexSearch
to limit its liability to the price of the contract. See Motorists Mut. Ins. Co. v.
ADT
Sec.
Sys.,
1995 WL 461316 (Ohio Ct. App. Aug. 4, 1995) (upholding as commercially
reasonable
and not unconscionable or substantially one-sided a limitation-of-liability clause
that tied liability
to
the contract price). The case that Doe relies on for the
proposition that
a limitation of liability
violates the Ohio Consumer Sales Practices Act is
an unpublished consent decree that
merely
states that the defendants in that case had improperly included
a
limitation-of-liability clause; it
does not suggest that such
clauses are always
unconscionable. State, ex rel.
Montgomery v.
Thermal Seal, Inc.,
2001 WL 1841771 (Ohio
Com. Pl. Sep. 18,
2001). The clause at issue is not
unconscionable within the meaning of § 1345.03(A) and so
Count Eight does not state a claim for
relief.
SexSearch’s right
to cancel, which Doe describes as “unilateral,” is likewise
not
unconscionable.
Members may cancel at any time; they must do so at least three
days before the
next monthly
billing cycle to avoid being charged for the next month, and they will not
receive a
refund
unless unusual circumstances apply. But those conditions hardly amount
to a
unilateral
right to cancel on SexSearch’s behalf. And when SexSearch does cancel a
paid
membership, it
will provide “a pro-rata refund for the unexpired period of the cancelled
month’s
membership by
automatic credit.” Furthermore, SexSearch’s power to cancel
memberships is presumably
designed to protect members from those who have violated the
Terms and
Conditions or posted
false content. Therefore the right to cancel is not unconscionable
within the meaning of
§
1345.03(A) and so Count Nine does not state a
claim for
relief. Count Ten does not specify
which clauses are so substantially one-sided as
to rise to
the level of unconscionability, but a
review of the Terms and Conditions does not
turn up
any candidates, and thus the dismissal of
Count Ten should also be affirmed.
Counts
Eleven through Thirteen allege common-law unconscionability in
the Terms and
Conditions. At
common law, unconscionability is a defense against
enforcement, not
a basis for
recovering damages. See, e.g., RESTATEMENT
(SECOND)
OF CONTRACTS
§ 208
(1981)
(“If a
contract or term thereof is unconscionable at the time the contract is made a
court may
refuse to
enforce the contract, or may enforce the remainder of the contract without the
unconscionable
term, or may so limit the application of any unconscionable term
as to
avoid any unconscionable
result.”); Bennet v. Behring Corp., 466 F. Supp. 698, 700
(S.D. Fla.
1979) (“[T]he equitable
theory of unconscionability has never been utilized to
allow for
the affirmative recovery of money
damages.”); Johnson v. Long Beach Mortg.
Loan Trust
2001- 4,
451 F. Supp. 2d 16, 36
(D.D.C. 2006) (“Plaintiff cannot
recover
compensatory damages under the common law doctrine
of unconscionability.”). If Doe were seeking
a declaratory judgment or reformation of the
contract, unconscionability could form
the basis of a
cause of action. See Johnson, 451 F. Supp.
2d at 36.
But he is not requesting
either of these
remedies, nor would either do him any good.
While we agree with the district
court’s
analysis of why Counts Eleven through Thirteen fail to
satisfy the two-prong
showing of
procedural unconscionability and substantive unconscionability,
see Doe, 502
F. Supp.
2d at 734-36, we note that it is unnecessary to analyze these elements
here, since
the
doctrine itself is inapplicable. Finally,
Count Fourteen alleges that SexSearch failed
to warn Doe that
a minor may be a member of the
service. A failure-to-warn claim requires (1)
a duty to warn,
(2) a breach
of that duty, and
(3) injury proximately resulting from the breach.
Freas v. Prater Contsr.
Corp.,
573 N.E.2d 27, 30 (Ohio 1991). Where the danger is open and
obvious, there is no
duty to
warn. Livengood v. ABS Contractors Supply, 710 N.E.2d 770, 772
(Ohio Ct. App.
1998).
“Where only one conclusion can be drawn from the established facts, the
issue of
whether a
risk was open and obvious may be decided by the court as a matter of law.”
Klauss
v. Glassman,
2005 WL 678984 at *3 (Ohio Ct. App. Mar. 24, 2005). A risk is
considered
open and obvious when its “dangers are within the body of knowledge common
to the
community” and “ generally
known and recognized by the ordinary consumer.”
Gawloski v.
Miller Brewing Co., 644
N.E.2d 731, 733 (Ohio Ct. App. 1994). In this case,
the danger
that
a member of SexSearch could be a minor is open and obvious. Internet
users’ anonymity and
potential for false personal representations are well known.
Doe was familiar with the
registration process and knew that SexSearch did nothing more
than asking members to check a
box indicating that they are at least eighteen. Furthermore, even if there
was a duty to
warn, the
statement in the Terms and Conditions that SexSearch could not
verify
members’ information
could be seen as a satisfaction of that duty. Therefore, Doe has
failed to
state a claim for failure
to warn.
III.
We,
therefore, AFFIRM the district court’s judgment dismissing
Doe’s complaint for
failure to state a claim.
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