Putting Kimkins on Notice

Kimkins - Proposed Notice of Pendency of Class Action

Regarding the Kimkins Class Action Lawsuit: This is NOT an official notice. This notice is proposed to the court by plaintiffs’ counsel June 26, 2009. If you choose to duplicate this notice on any blog or website, this notice MUST be included.








(Many thanks to Prudentia for originally posting this. I don't know how to make the document images bigger, so you can read the full content on Prudentia's blog here.)

Hacking Attempt?

NEW UPDATE:
The hits just keep on comin', folks! That's right, someone has made ANOTHER attempt to hijack my other abandoned blog. That is the third try in a little over a week.

Desperate much?


UPDATE:
It has been a week since the previous hacking attempt. I just got notification from WordPress that a second attempt by someone else seeking to take over my blog was made today. That is a lot of interest in a 2-and-a-half year old blog with only 3 posts.

-----------------original post-----------------


OK, sometimes coincidences are just coincidences. Sometimes, they are more. Which is which?


A long time ago in a galaxy far far away, I started a WordPress blog to chronicle and hold me accountable for my weight loss. Pretty good idea --- except I couldn't figure out all the ins and out of WordPress at the time and eventually forgot my password. When I decided to renew blogging, it was easier to start all over here on Blogger than to retrace my steps on a barely-begun blog.

Two and a half years passed. I almost forgot I ever had another blog attempt. Then I just now got this email from WordPress (and yes, it is legit --- I checked that already).

Someone has asked to reset the password for the following site and username.

http://WordPress.com/

Username: xxxxxx (redacted)

To reset your password visit the following address, otherwise just ignore this email and nothing will happen.

What is up with that? It's not like it was ever a big deal blog. I think I had maybe 3 entries in all, and hardly ever any views. Why would someone want to hijack it?

Who would do that? Anyone have any ideas?

I do.

Quick Summary of the Kimkins Debacle

A 'real life' friend found this blog via a post made elsewhere and left a comment on my previous blog post, knowing nothing of the Kimkins lawsuit. Oh, my --- where to even BEGIN to describe everything that has happened in that strange sage over the last few years?! I attempted to give her a quick rundown within the limits of the 4,096 characters that Blogger allows in a comment. In case other people ask the same in future, I decided to copy my response into its own post. This is that attempt:

As for catching up on the lawsuit: Let me 'splain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up.

An obese but clever sociopathic narcissist gained footage at a popular established low carb diet site, where she claimed to have lost 198 lbs. in a year and to have maintained for 5 years. Her drastic claims and caustic passive-aggressive personality sparked flame wars which ultimately provided excuse to stomp off and open a paid membership site with impressive success stories and before/after photos.

All seemed wonderful at first. People were happy and losing weight. In June, 2007, a magazine featured the diet, 40,000 people joined, and the owner made a million+ dollars in a month. But to validate her marketing claims of "No faster weight loss, none" she pushed lower and lower calories, fasting, and even daily laxative use. People began having problems, for which she ALWAYS had an explanation (usually with a little dig at the complainant.) The gloss began to wear off and the spell was broken.

People questioned things, including photos. When her responses were unsatisfactory, some of us left. Things blew up completely when, about a month later, she was photographed at 300+ lbs, with NO resemblance to her supposed 'after' photos. The site boiled with protest and she summarily banned any "lifetime" members who dared to speak up.

Various online sites and personalities got involved in internet battles. Her supporters wanted to cling to their addictively fast weight loss and the site that enabled it, though many switched sides as evidence emerged.
Her detractors/victims felt used and abused, crushed, betrayed, defrauded, and outraged.

A fiesty woman named Jeanessa stepped up and found a brilliant health-crusading attorney named John Tiedt, who believed in the case enough to take it on contingency.

Discoveries were made which revealed that Heidi Diaz lived in a labyrinthian world of her own making, a convoluted web of deviousness and deception. She never lost any significant amount of weight, even with gastric bypass surgery. Most of her success stories were complete fabrications, with photos stolen from Russian mail-order bride sites.

She has hidden behind false identities, claimed someone else owned the site, spitefully dissipated assets to keep them from her victims, and launched vengeful campaigns, legal and otherwise, against some of the principle witnesses in the case.

She tried to countersue us; the court threw it out. She tried to file bankruptcy to halt the suit; the court threw it out. She has tried threats and intimidation; it backfires.

Meanwhile, John Tiedt and associates have scored victory after victory. John has won unprecedented rulings from the court. The case has been granted class action status, and John has petitioned the court for summary judgment. Since the defendant already admitted under oath in deposition to everything in the suit, we hope the court sees it our way. We should know soon.

. . . I clearly need to tighten up my summaries and use fewer words. But, believe me, this barely scratches the surface.

This story really ought to be a book or movie.

I guess I can add that several televison news shows and newspapers have covered this.

Here is a fuller explanation from Laura Dolson of about.com:
http://lowcarbdiets.about.com/od/populardietplans/a/kimkinsdiet.htm
(I might quibble with a couple of minor points, such as when I actually left Kimkins vs. when 'Kimmer" admitted I had left, but this is overall a thorough, well-researched report.)

I hope this helps pull the highlights into one place.j

Some People Just Don't Learn

OK, I know I have a lot of blogging to do to catch up. Let's see . . I need to post about:

- weight loss, low carbing, good food, some recent victories in that area, etc. --- the original purpose of this blog

- the Motion for Summary Judgment in the Kimkins case, filed by Tiedt and Cohen --- Go, John and Michael!

- the attempt by someone claiming to be Diaz' attorney Peabody to ask for my personal info via blog comment (as someone named Interested) so he/she/whoever could issue me a Cease and Desist order --- yeah, that's how most attorneys do it.

BUT, then, THIS just happened!

I recently joined Twitter and was trying to get that figured out and set up.
Part of that process allowed me to check my email accounts for contacts there who are already on Twitter.

Check out the first entry on that list:


In case you can't see that, it says:
mommy25boys
Leslie Spiegel
heidi.k.diaz@gmail.com

I remember getting an email from someone named mommy25boys a while back, at least several months now. It seemed to be from a former Kimkins member who had left, but needed to lose some weight and was thinking about going back. She wanted to know what was going on, what I knew about the whole deal, whether she could do the diet safely, and so on. I remember that it 'felt' a little odd, but I had known someone at the Kimkins site who, as I recall, was Momto5boys, or something like that, so it seemed plausible. (Someone help me out on this one.) I have gotten hundreds of similar emails and private messages at various sites since I left Kimkins (in fact, I got one today on Facebook), so it did not seem unusual, except that I did have a funny feeling about that one. Still, I answered it.

I guarantee I did not see a sender email address of heidi.k.diaz@gmail.com on the email, or I would not even have opened it. Nor did I see the name Leslie Spiegel. I thought Momto5boys was named Marcy.

So, I am wondering if Heidi.K.Diaz hid the correct address somehow, redirected it or something, but Twitter somehow discerned the correct account of origin.

That seems weird and maybe implausible --- but then, everything about this whole situation has been weird and implausible!

Anyway, it would seem that, during the course of this lawsuit, Heidi Diaz emailed me under a false identity to fish for ammunition to use against me.

Heidi/Kimmer/Vanessa/Nicole/Noelle/Jeri/etc./etc./etc. use a false identity? I'm shocked! I thought she swore she has turned over a new leaf and given up her evil ways!

Heidi Diaz come after me? Oh, yeah. This is not nearly the first time she has done mean and dishonest things to get to me. Hmmm . . . so she thinks I should roll over, be quiet, and pull my blog . . . while she pulls stunts like this?

I don't think so.

CPK Cobb Salad for Lunch --- and Dinner!

Yesterday, Donnie and I and one of the sons decided to use these scratch-up coupons from California Pizza Kitchen that had appeared at our house. I remembered having a great garlicky chicken caesar salad there, and figured I would get that, sans croutons.

I also remembered lots of delicious wood-fired pizzas there, too, but I am low-carbing, so those were out! I have learned not even to look at the menu section for things that are off-limits for me, so I contentedly checked out the salad section.

My husband LOVES Cobb salads, and was pleased to see one on the menu. For some reason, at the last minute, I ordered one, too, instead of the planned chicken caesar salad.

WOW! Is that a LOT of food?! I ordered a full salad --- should have gotten the half-salad instead. (Note to Self: When a place offers half-salads, that is a clue that their full salads are too big!)

It was big and jam-packed with plenty of rich items. The CPK menu describes it as:

Chopped lettuce with applewood smoked bacon, fresh avocado, grilled chicken, diced tomatoes, chopped egg, basil and Gorgonzola cheese with our herb ranch dressing or blue cheese dressing. Fresh beets added upon request.

We both got the works, with blue cheese dressing. My DH gave me the avocado from his salad, since he is not a fan of the yummy green stuff. (Something is wrong with that!) I gave him my beets, though I AM a fan of their ruby goodness, since they are somewhat carby for me.

I didn't realize the salad would arrive with the lettuce already tossed with AMPLE dressing. By the time I mixed in all the other goodies, including double avocado, it was a pretty creamy salad, more like cold creamy soup with lettuce mixed in than like crisp fresh salad greens with a bit a dressing.

Don't get me wrong --- I liked it! It was pretty heavy though. Online sources put it at 585 calories and 10 net carbs, which is well within my daily target, but just more than I normally have for a lunch.

I would have preferred that the dressing not be mixed in already; if I order this again, I will ask for that. That way, I could still get a whole salad, which is a better bargain than a half-salad, yet the half I take home would not get soggy.

Maybe I'll just save the heavy salads for hungrier days.

Anyway, we had a pleasant meal, good conversation, and enough leftover Cobb salad for my dinner, all at 10% off.