Numerous Victims of Nicole Prause’s Malicious Reporting and Malicious Use of Process

stop harassment

Introduction

Nicole Prause has shown a consistent and troubling pattern of (1) filing groundless, malicious complaints and lawsuits, and (2) threatening such actions, or publicly claiming that she has filed them, when she has not done so. (Four main pages documenting Prause’s behaviors: page 1, page 2, page 3, page 4.)

Below is a partial list of such complaints and false claims. (Out of fear of reprisal we have been asked to omit additional individuals and organizations.) Also, Prause regularly claims “whistleblower status” to keep her activities under the radar. So, there are likely other, non-public complaints in addition to those listed here.

The baseless administrative complaints Prause actually lodged were generally dismissed as nuisance filings. However, a few led to time-consuming investigations that were ultimately dismissed or produced little in the way of substantive results.

Malicious Reporting

Staci Sprout LICSW – (see this page by Staci Sprout: Bullying, harassment and defamation from unexpected sources as a sex addiction recovery activist)

Reported to Washington State’s Department of Health, twice. (no action)
Reported to National Association of Social Workers. (no action)
In 2020, Prause also filed a groundless small claims suit in California against Staci Sprout. It was dismissed in 2021 for improper venue.
In 2021, Prause filed another small claims suit against Staci Sprout in Washington. It is pending.
PDF of Staci Sprout’s affidavit filed in Rhodes v Prause recounting events.

Fight the New Drug – Reported to Utah’s Division of Child and Family Services on the theory that sharing first-hand stories of porn recovery constituted the abuse of minors. DCFS took no action.

Rory Reid PhD – Prause’s former colleague at UCLA. Appears to have been reported to UCLA (and perhaps to the California Psychology Board). Prause’s attacks on him began concurrently with UCLA’s decision not to renew her contract, bringing her academic career to an end.

Five documents currently on Prause’s AmazonAWS website urging readers to report Rory Reid to the state of California: page1, page2, page3, page4, page5. (Update – Prause deleted the 5 Rory Reid pages after this page was published). The screenshots are preserved in these 2 sections:
- December, 2014: Prause employs an alias to attack & defame UCLA colleague Rory Reid, PhD (on a porn-recovery forum).
- September 2016: Prause attacks and libels former UCLA colleague Rory C. Reid PhD. 2 years earlier “TellTheTruth” posted the exact same claims & documents on a porn recovery site frequented by Prause’s many sock puppets

Linda Hatch PhD – (July, 2019: Linda Hatch, PhD affidavit: Donald Hilton defamation lawsuit against Nicole R Prause & Liberos LLC.)

Reported to CA Psych Board (no action)
Reported to the APA (no action)
Prause also sent Hatch a groundless cease & desist letter: Prause silencing people with fake “no contact” demands and spurious cease & desist letters (Linda Hatch, Rob Weiss, Gabe Deem, Gary Wilson, Marnia Robinson, Alex Rhodes, etc.)

Bradley Green PhD – (July, 2019: Bradley Green, PhD affidavit: Donald Hilton defamation lawsuit against Nicole R Prause & Liberos LLC.)

Reported to University of Southern Mississippi (No action)
Reported to journal where one of his papers appeared (Sexual Addiction & Compulsivity). Journal publisher investigated and took no further action.

Jason Carroll PhD – Reported to Brigham Young University because Prause didn’t like research results (No action)

Geoff Goodman PhD – Reported to Long Island University for “harassment” (No action)

The Reward Foundation 

Reported to Scottish Charity Regulator for alleged misdeeds (No action) – 2015 & 2016: Prause violates COPE’s code of conduct to harass Gary Wilson and a Scottish charity
Reported to collective where the charity is domiciled (The Melting Pot) – The exploits of “Janey Wilson” (a Prause alias) (No action)
July, 2018: In emails, in the ICD-11 comments section, and on Wikipedia, Prause and her sockpuppets falsely claim that Wilson received 9,000 pounds from The Reward Foundation (Disproved, publicly)

Alexander Rhodes of Nofap

Prause claimed publicly to have reported Rhodes to the FBI. An FOIA request shows the FBI had no such report.
Prause falsely claimed to a mainstream TV producer to have a restraining order against Alex Rhodes: Rhodes files a defamation lawsuit against Nicole Prause / Liberos LLC.
Prause reported Rhodes to the Pennsylvania Board of Psychology for practicing psychology without a license because CNN filmed him in a group with other young men, all talking about porn’s effects. No therapy was offered or provided. (Investigation in progress). RealYBOP tweet asking followers to report Rhodes to psych Board. See: February/March 2020: Prause reports Alex Rhodes to the Pennsylvania Board of Psychology for practicing psychology without a license because CNN filmed him in a group with other young men, all talking about porn’s effect.
Prause reported Rhodes to Pennsylvania’s Bureau of Corporations and Charitable Organizations for his fundraising effort.
Appears that Prause reported Donor Box for hosting Alex Rhodes’s fundraiser: January-March, 2020: Prause incites defamatory UK article in an effort to have Alex Rhodes’s “Donor Box” fundraising campaign removed.

Gabe Deem, founder of RebootNation – Prause (falsely) reported to TIME Magazine that Gabe Deem impersonated a doctor to write a formal critique of her study (letter to the editor) in an academic journal (and the letter was traced to Gabe’s computer). In late 2020, Prause publicly threatened Deem with a small claims suit.

Multiple incidents of Prause & her alias (@BrainOnPorn) defaming and harassing Gabe Deem:

Exodus Cry – (July, 2019: Laila Haddad affidavit: Donald Hilton defamation lawsuit against Nicole R Prause & Liberos LLC.)

Prause reported Exodus Cry to the Missouri Attorney General for having a fraudulent mission statement for their 501c3 – February, 2019: Prause falsely accuses Exodus Cry of fraud. Asks Twitter followers to report the non-profit to the Missouri attorney general (for spurious reasons), Appears to have edited the CEO’s Wikipedia page (No action)
Laila Mickelwait/Exodus Cry affidavit for Rhodes v Prause.

John Adler MD – Prause reported Professor Adler to Stanford University for “harassment” (No action)

CUREUS journal – Prause reported the journal to PubMed Central, trying to have it de-listed and thus discredited (No action)

Don Hilton, MD – Reported to the university where he mentors neurosurgery students, the Texas Medical Board, and academic journals with unfounded claims that he faked his credentials (No action)

July, 2019: Donald Hilton amends defamation lawsuit to include affidavits from 9 other victims of Prause, Texas Board of Medical Examiners complaint, incorrectly accusing Dr. Hilton of falsifying his credentials.

Keren Landman, MD – Prause asked VICE magazine to terminate expert Dr. Landman for writing an article recommending use of condoms in porn in support of Proposition 60. Unbelievable.

Most of the 7 physicians who co-authored Park et al., 2016 – Prause reported them to their state medical boards for simply being on the paper (more about Prause’s unrelenting malice related to the paper, which disagreed with her views: Prause’s (failed) efforts to have Behavioral Sciences review paper (Park et al., 2016) retracted) (No action)

Gary Wilson, who co-authored that same paper

Background – Prause’s failed efforts to have Behavioral Sciences review paper (Park et al., 2016) retracted
Prause claimed publicly and repeatedly to have reported Wilson to the FBI twice (FOIA request showed FBI had no such report)
Reported to the Oregon Psychology Board by an “anonymous” party, for practicing psychology without a license. (Dismissed without further action.)
Claimed publicly Wilson was reported to the police (LAPD and UCLA PD) since 2013 (No evidence of such reports for years. Eventually Prause filed an LAPD report in 2018, which Wilson wasn’t even informed of…until Prause persuaded a gullible school newspaper editor to publish it in 2019 [swiftly removed by university officials]. See March 17, 2019: Article by University of Wisconsin-Lacrosse student newspaper (The Racquet) posts false police report by Nicole Prause.) (No action by LAPD)
(Apparently) reported Wilson to the ISSM (International Society for Sexual Medicine) for heaven knows what, which canceled his keynote address scheduled for March, 2018 in Lisbon without giving a reason. Then Prause began a social media campaign saying someone had been “removed for an actual good reason from a conference,” and claimed (again) that Gary had misrepresented his credentials (he hadn’t). Gary soon received his Oregon Psychology Board exoneration (see above), so she may also have told the ISSM earlier that he had been “reported for practicing psychology without a license” among other misleading information – in order to persuade the ISSM to cancel him.
Reported Gary’s site yourbrainonporn.com 3 times for copyright violations using groundless DMCA take-down requests in attempt to remove documentation of her defamation and harassment from his site. (No action)
November 19, 2019: When the groundless DMCA takedowns failed to remove evidence of Prause’s defamation and harassment she sent a spurious Cease and Desist letter to Gary Wilson’s webhost, Linode. (No action)
In November 2019, Prause apparently successfully applied for protection under California’s “Safe At Home” program, falsely claiming that Wilson had threatened her and posted her home address on his website. November, 2019: Prause enters the California “Safe At Home Program” under false pretenses, misusing it to harass her victims and critics. Prause repeatedly used her status to intimidate others, groundlessly accusing her critics and Gary’s web host Linode of violating the Safe At Home act.
January, 2020: When Prause’s spurious Cease & Desist letter failed (it falsely stated that Prause’s home address was on YBOP), she attempted again to remove YBOP by threatening its web host Linode with a second Cease & Desist letter. This too failed as Wilson’s site does not have her home address. (No action)
February, 2020: When the above C&D failed, Prause called Wilson’s local Ashland Police, attempting to file a false police report, lying that her home address was on YBOP. Officer Jason St. John determined Prause’s claims did not allege a crime and that this was a civil matter.
On February 12 or thereabouts, Prause sought a temporary restraining order against Wilson, based in part on pictures of people (quite obviously not Wilson) holding guns. The judge denied the TRO, but set a hearing for a permanent restraining order on March 6, 2020. Prause did not serve Wilson, but Wilson’s counsel appeared as if she had, thus waiving service. The judge continued the matter until March 25, 2020. Wilson later filed an anti-SLAPP motion against Prause for misusing the legal system (TRO) to silence and harass him. On August 6, the Los Angeles County Superior Court ruled that Prause’s attempt to obtain a restraining order against him constituted a frivolous and illegal “strategic lawsuit against public participation” (commonly called a “SLAPP suit”). In essence, the Court found that Prause abused the restraining order process to bully Wilson into silence and undercut his rights to free speech. By law, the SLAPP ruling obligated Prause to pay Wilson’s attorney fees.
In December, 2020 Prause filed a small claims court suit against Wilson in OR, alleging defamation and contract interference. Case No. 20SC25610. At a hearing on January 22, 2021 an Oregon court ruled in my favor and charged Prause with costs and an additional penalty.
In January, 2021 Prause sent Wilson another demand letter alleging various demonstrably false things.

MDPI – The parent company of the journal that published the review Wilson co-authored with Navy physicians (documentation: Prause’s efforts to have Behavioral Sciences review paper (Park et al., 2016) retracted).

Prause reported the journal to COPE (journal ethics review board) (Superficial response, but paper has not been retracted.)
And to PubMed Central (No action)
And to the FTC (No action)

Note: In 2019 MDPI posted two official statements related to the unethical behavior of Nicole Prause (such actions appear to be without precedent):

D.J. Burr – Prause reported therapist Burr to Washington State’s Department of Health. (No action)

April, 2019: Prause harasses and threatens therapist D.J. Burr, then maliciously reports him to the State of Washington Department of Health

Prause has also repeatedly, publicly urged members of the public, via social media, to report professionals and professional organizations to psychology boards, to the FTC, and to the Attorney General. Sections of Prause page with documentation:

Diana Davison – Prause threatened journalist Diana Davison and The Post Millennial by means of a spurious cease & desist letter threatening legal action because they published a factual expose’ that was not flattering to Prause. (No action)

November, 2019: In response to Diana Davison’s Post Millennial expose’ Prause harasses/defames Davison, followed by a bogus Cease & Desist letter and demanding $10,000.

Jonathon Van Maren – In response to my legal victories over Nicole Prause, LifeSite News published the following interview: Anti-porn crusader details legal victory against ‘porn prof’ who tried to use the court to shut him down: Gary Wilson was sued by Nicole Prause, who viciously smeared him in an attempt to discredit his ongoing research into how pornography is harmful. He won. As occurred with Diana Davison’s Post Millennial expose’, Prause and her alias account (@BrainOnPorn) harassed the author, lied about what the article said, and threatened a lawsuit. See:

August, 2020: LifeSite News publishes a Gary Wilson interview; Prause harasses & defames the author, threatens legal action (of course she did)

Aaron Minc JD – In July 2020, Prause urged her Twitter followers to republished her defamatory tweets falsely accusing Minc of sending her private information to ‘people that have been threatening to kill her for years’. Despite Minc’s public denial on Twitter, one of Prause’s duped followers directly messaged and/or shared the defamatory tweets with the Ohio State Bar Association, Cleveland Metropolitan Bar Association, and the Ohio Supreme Court’s twitter accounts, falsely claiming that Minc had engaged in an ethics violation. For added effect, the duped follower attached a screenshot image of the Ohio Rules of Professional Conduct 4.4 taken from the Ohio Supreme Court website. Prause was later added as a co-defendant. See: April, 2021: Melissa Farmer spreads Prause’s lies and has to settle costly lawsuit.

Aaron Minc vs Melissa Farmer

Rebecca Watson (skepchick) – April, 2021: A Watson video contained a 2-minute update on Prause’s legal affairs, which lead to Prause falsely reporting Watson to YouTube and Patreon for violating terms of service. YouTube pulled the video. Watson responded by uploading an 18-minute video chronicling the entire story. See these pages:

Malicious Use of Process

After years of malicious administrative reporting, spurious cease & desist letters, and misuse of law enforcement personnel, Prause, in 2019, began abusing the court system (and the targets of her wrath) with malicious legal proceedings (and continued threats of legal proceedings) in order to silence anyone who calls attention to her bias or activity.

As recounted above, she filed an invalid small claims court suit against therapist Sprout in CA and another suit in WA, a baseless restraining order against Wilson in CA, and a defamation suit against him in OR.

In addition, to suppress criticism of herself, Prause has threatened multiple social media accounts with groundless small claims court lawsuits – and filed a suit against 2 of them, which she did not pursue. In this way, she continues to silence people’s right to free speech about her activities and apparent bias.

1) Tom Jackson (@LivingThoreau) – November, 2019

Prause publicly demanded $10,000 not to file suit, and then filed it. Jackson deleted his Twitter account. Prause did not appear at the trial and the case was dropped. The suit served its purpose of silencing Jackson, who had backed up his opinions with indisputable photographic evidence of Prause attending porn industry events. Details – https://www.yourbrainonporn.com/relevant-research-and-articles-about-the-studies/critiques-of-questionable-debunking-propaganda-pieces/nicole-prauses-unethical-harassment-and-defamation-of-gary-wilson-others-3/#Jackson

2) Mark Schuenemann (@Kurall_Creator) – November, 2019

Again, Prause demanded $10,000 or she would sue. But didn’t. Details: https://www.yourbrainonporn.com/relevant-research-and-articles-about-the-studies/critiques-of-questionable-debunking-propaganda-pieces/nicole-prauses-unethical-harassment-and-defamation-of-gary-wilson-others-3/#Mark

3) Fearless Dan (YouTube channel) – November, 2019

Around the time the Rhodes v. Prause defamation lawsuit was filed, YouTuber Fearless Dan posted a short video discussing the Rhodes suit and Prause’s long, documented history of defamation and harassment. His video contained images of him scrolling through the first YBOP Prause page, showing the table of contents, and briefly highlighting a few sections. Fearless Dan’s video was factually accurate and defamed no one. Nevertheless, Prause reported it to YouTube and threatened Fearless Dan with legal action. Details: November, 2019: Prause misuses “Safe At Home Program”: She threatens YouTube channel with legal action, falsely claiming a video was defamatory & linked to her home address on YBOP.

4) December, 2019: @samosirmatthew Matthew

Prause threatened to sue him for saying she sounded like a “Foundation funded propagandist.” Details: https://www.yourbrainonporn.com/relevant-research-and-articles-about-the-studies/critiques-of-questionable-debunking-propaganda-pieces/nicole-prauses-unethical-harassment-and-defamation-of-gary-wilson-others-3/#Matthew

5) January, 2020: TranshumanAI

Prause informed this guy he was being sued after he publicized some facts about her. He deleted his tweet and changed his Twitter account name. Details: https://www.yourbrainonporn.com/relevant-research-and-articles-about-the-studies/critiques-of-questionable-debunking-propaganda-pieces/nicole-prauses-unethical-harassment-and-defamation-of-gary-wilson-others-3/#AI

6) March, 2020: “anonymous”

This person (who has asked to remain anonymous) called out Prause on her well documented ties to the porn industry. Prause went after their job and threatened a suit. The person made their account private. Details: https://www.yourbrainonporn.com/relevant-research-and-articles-about-the-studies/critiques-of-questionable-debunking-propaganda-pieces/nicole-prauses-unethical-harassment-and-defamation-of-gary-wilson-others-3/#anon

7) May, 2020: Charles Zhang of DonorBox

After DonorBox Founder Charles Zhang dared to tweet (and comment on) the ScramNews apology and payment to Alexander Rhodes and NoFap, Prause demanded $10K and threatened Zhang with a lawsuit based on misrepresentations of Zhang’s tweets. See this section for the details: May, 2020: Nicole Prause threatens DonorBox CEO (Charles Zhang) with a small claims lawsuit for revealing her lies, behind the scenes harassment and malicious reporting (all in a failed attempt take down Rhodes’s crowdfunding).

8) November, 2020: Bill Tavis (YouTube commenter)

Tavis pointed out that Prause was pictured attending an XRCO (porn industry) award show, and Prause accused him of defamation and threatened him with a lawsuit to try to stop him from posting the link to irrefutable photographic evidence. When challenged with the truth Prause doubles down on her falsehood. PDF of their back and forth.

9) December, 2020: Gabe Deem

Prause threatened Deem with a defamation suit on Twitter after accusing him of various statements he hadn’t made, or which are clearly not defamatory.

10) December, 2020: Gary Wilson

Undeterred by her loss in CA after she filed a frivolous restraining order request, in December, 2020 Prause sued Wilson for defamation. At a hearing on January 22, an Oregon Court ruled that Prause had not made her case, and that Wilson was entitled to court costs and an additional penalty as the prevailing party.

11) January, 2021: Staci Sprout

After Prause’s CA suit against Sprout was dismissed for improper venue, she filed a case against Sprout in WA. It is pending.