Judge dismisses Tucson lawmaker's harassment injunction

Scottsdale resident Geoff Coffin drove to Tucson on March 11 to challenge the injunction. He told The Arizona Republic he spent $5,000 to defend himself and may seek reimbursement from the couple who named him in the court action: Republican Rep. Rachel Keshel and her husband, Seth Keshel.

"I will speak with my attorney next week about my next steps," Geoff Coffin said after attending a hearing before Pima County Superior Court Judge Cynthia Kuhn.

The case raised several questions, including when anonymous social media users could be forced to reveal their true identity.

Seth Keshel is a retired U.S. Army captain and a nationally known election conspiracy promoter, or “conspiracy realist,” as he puts it. He said after the hearing he wasn’t surprised at the outcome, but the problem of identifying William Coffin remains.

An X.com account that bears the name William Coffin and goes by the handle @coffinitup online has repeatedly accused Rachel Keshel of unlawfully living outside of the Tucson-area district in which she was elected. The Keshels claim they've been harassed and doxxed in dozens of posts over the past two months, though William Coffin does not appear to have posted their exact addresses online.

William Coffin told The Republic he’s not sure “how any of it rose to the threshold of harassment and doxxing in the first place. There is zero evidence of any direct communication with the Keshels (required for harassment) and there is zero evidence of any doxxing.”

The issue of Keshel’s residency in her district was barely mentioned in the hearing.

Keshel previously showed The Republic her voter ID card and driver’s license, proving she has a rented home in Legislative District 17, which includes Marana and parts of Tucson. She explained she doesn’t always stay at Seth Keshel’s home in Vail, which is just outside her district.

Circumstantial evidence disputed

Whether the online figure actually harassed the couple wasn't addressed in the 90-minute hearing. Kuhn told the parties she would first address the issue of identification.

Kuhn said "it makes sense, to the extent possible, that the plaintiffs first establish” they have the right person.

Seth Keshel took the stand without a lawyer and tried to link Geoff Coffin to the X.com account with evidence from his own investigation. He focused on three main coincidences: Geoff Coffin and his wife work with horses and William Coffin once posted he “pets horses every day;” a blue geolocation dot in the area of Geoff Coffin’s Scottsdale home showed up in a map posted by William Coffin; and William Coffin seems to know details about a man related to Geoff Coffin.

The court commissioner who signed the injunction and a judge in a separate case appeared to agree William Coffin was committing cyberstalking and harassment, Seth Keshel said. Yet the county attorney in Pima County declined the couple’s request to issue a subpoena to X.com that would reveal William Coffin’s identity, he said. Without a subpoena or admission from William Coffin, the couple had no choice but to present circumstantial evidence, he said.

Josh Austin, the lawyer Geoff Coffin hired for the hearing, questioned Seth Keshel’s basic assumptions that William Coffin was a man whose last name was Coffin.

“Why would someone who’s trying to hide their identify tell the truth?” Austin asked.

He asked Seth Keshel if he had registration records for the X.com account, IP addresses or other subscriber information to prove Geoff Coffin ran the account. Seth Keshel acknowledged he did not.

“You have no firsthand knowledge of who actually operates that account,” Austin told him.

Geoff Coffin, on the witness stand, denied he controlled the account. He also denied he was in Tucson during harassment the Keshels experienced, which included someone banging on their door one night and a drone flyover.

“I don’t understand what’s going on,” Geoff Coffin told the court when questioned by Seth Keshel. “I have nothing to do with this. So these accusations that you’re saying go over my head because I wasn’t part of this.”

After a short recess, Kuhn said Seth Keshel’s argument that Geoff Coffin was the man they sought didn’t meet the burden of proof by preponderance of evidence, the standard of evidence in the case. But if more evidence comes up, she said, the Keshels could file another injunction.

Unmasking a ‘high standard’

Gregg Leslie, executive director of Arizona State University's First Amendment Clinic, said unmasking an anonymous political pundit isn’t usually taken lightly.

Americans have a First Amendment right to publish political discourse anonymously, he explained, but authorities could force an unmasking if the pundit crosses a line into actual threats.

If someone is “just complaining about you” and are exercising their First Amendment, an unmasking wouldn’t be appropriate because the person could legally publish such complaints, he said. There’s also the possibility an anonymous person could come to harm if they’re exposed, giving another reason for courts to be careful in ordering an unmasking, Leslie said.

If the “harassment” is simply complaining about “things you don’t like, then the person trying to get that kind of injunction should never win," he said.

Rachel Keshel: Law may need updating

Rachel Keshel also testified in the case, saying she considers herself a “tough cookie” but that William Coffin’s “cyber-harassment” has unsettled and sometimes “terrified” her.

She utilizes a state program to hide her address since her old house “almost burned down” in what she said was an arson attempt. Keshel had previously told The Republic there’s no official report of that incident.

William Coffin’s posts provoked “fear” for her and her family, she told the court.

“It is very alarming because a lot of what happens online is you feel that it’s going to incite people into something, to intentionally come and find me,” she said. “As a legislator, I’m going to be looking at cyberstalking, the law that we have, and maybe putting some more teeth into it.”