Back in 2018, I joined an online Porsche enthusiast forum called Rennlist. I had the misfortune of interacting with a member on that forum named Sticky, who I later came to discover was named Joseph Wilk. We had some entertaining arguments and banter back and forth on Rennlist about performance modifications, where I eventually tired of his nonsense and made him a $10,000 wager that basically everything he was claiming about his car’s modifications (like 0-60 times, 1/4 mile, HP numbers, etc) was BS. He refused to accept the bet, the forum members jumped on the bandwagon realizing that he was unwilling to back up his claims and he was eventually banned. Since then, he has returned many times under phony usernames and IP addresses, but he can’t help himself and eventually gets outed and banned again. This has happened well over a dozen times.
So, fast forward a few weeks after our interaction, I get a call from a friend who says “buddy, have you seen this website about you?” I ask what website and he tells me it’s www.boostaddict.com. I look into the ownership and I find out its Joseph Wilk. Joseph owned multiple automotive websites, all under the “boost” names. Apparently, Joseph got so unhinged about being humiliated and banned from the forums, that he decided to write an entire article about me and my family using my real name, home address, phone numbers, kids names, wife’s name, email addresses… you get the idea. He directs his nearly 50 automotive websites and all their traffic, to the article about me and my family, making it the number one spot on Google searches. In addition, he writes that I am a crook who steals your identity, sells fake car parts, yada-yada-yada. Kinda crazy as I never met this guy in my life, never bought or sold anything to or from him and he goes on tilt over a Rennlist forum thread.
I send him an email to take it down. I explain that I am not the one who banned him, the article is not only defamatory, but it is harmful to me, my family, and my business. He laughs and basically tells me to go “F” myself. I hire an LA lawyer to send him a cease-and-desist letter, which he ignores. Now, I decide to bring a lawsuit against him, there is no other way to get him to comply. When we go to serve him with the legal papers he goes into hiding. Multiple attempts were made by process servers who see him through the window of his apartment watching TV but refuses to answer the door. What to do? I hire a private investigator to stake out his house and wait for him to come outside. He sees the private investigators, so he never leaves the house and squats 24/7. What to do? We set up a sting operation with fake email address, fake burner telephone number and trick him into meeting a “fellow enthusiast” to sell him $8000 in aftermarket Porsche parts. We agree to meet in a Walgreens parking lot about 2 miles from his home. We hire a little old lady as the process server. When he arrives, she walks up to him and says “wow that’s a lovely car” Joseph says “thank you” then the little old lady tells him ”Joseph Wilk, you’ve been served”. The process server described Joseph as a “pudgy, short white guy” and that he was sobbing like a little baby saying “are you kidding me? Is this really happening?” Yeah Joe, now it’s really happening.
Fast forward… after 13 months of more stake outs, more process servers and a full blown lawsuit, the court awards me nearly 4 million dollars in damages. Keep in mind he STILL refuses to take down the defamatory article and rather than try and settle like any normal person would, he doubles down and buys more domain names, my wife’s domain name, both of my kids domain names, my wife’s maiden name… you get the idea. He continues to post new defamatory content every few weeks, adds my email address to all sorts of gay websites, trans websites, communist party websites, etc. That’s why they make email filters I suppose.
What do I do? How does this end? Click on the timeline and follow along for the ride..