What is the Karl Jobst controversy? Billy Mitchell's defamation lawsuit explained as YouTuber loses thousands of subscribers

On April 1, 2025, Australian YouTuber and speedrunner Karl Jobst was ordered by a Brisbane district court to pay $350,000 plus interest and costs to American professional video gamer William “Billy” Mitchell. The latter sued the former for defamation in September 2024.

Jobst, who makes content related to exposing cheating and fraud in the gaming community, made a series of allegations against Mitchell in a 2021 YouTube video. He stirred controversy after accusing Billy of using unfair practices such as cheating and “pursuing unmeritorious litigation” against others who had also accused him of the same, and wrongly linked him to YouTuber Apollo Legend’s suicide.

Karl’s video indirectly blamed William for the December 2020 suicide of Legend, whose real name was Benjamin Smith. The former claimed Apollo was stressed due to his “settlement” with Mitchell, and falsely alleged that the deceased had to pay the gamer a “large sum of money.”

However, Judge Ken Barlow ruled against Karl Jobst on Tuesday, citing that he made five defamatory imputations against Billy Mitchell in his video, especially hinting “in essence, hounded Apollo Legend to death.” According to Barlow, this was “based on fallacy” and Jobst had been “recklessly indifferent” to facts.

Jobst denied defaming the gamer and argued that Billy already had a bad reputation and was exposed as a cheat in the past. While the judge agreed on the same, he found Karl guilty of causing distress and further damaging Mitchell’s image and asked him to pay the gamer $350,000.

Notably, Jobst’s claim that Billy expressed “joy at the thought of” Apollo Legend’s death was also dismissed by the court. The judge reviewed Legend’s final video and found that it had no mention of William Mitchell.

Billy Mitchell’s original lawsuit against the speedrunner sought $400,000 in general damages and $50,000 in aggravated damages.

---

Exploring further the Karl Jobst and Billy Mitchell drama

On Tuesday, Karl Jobst was asked by Judge Ken Barlow to pay Billy Mitchell $300,000 in damages for non-economic loss, and an extra $50,000 in aggravated damages, as the YouTuber published his video against the gamer multiple times. The court also awarded $40,000 in interest on the damages alongside Mitchell’s costs, as per The Guardian reports.

While the original video was posted in May 2021 and amassed 500,000 views, it was later edited with allegations against Michell addressed/ clarified. Karl also published a retraction video in July of that year, which contained a mockery of Billy’s complaint against him, calling him a “con man.”

The judge noted it didn’t entirely withdraw the allegations, nor did Jobst issue an apology, but rather expressed “clear malice” towards the Donkey Kong champion. Ken Barlow also claimed Karl Jobst had a “self-aggrandizing and perhaps self-protective tendency not to admit error and not to back down once he has taken a stance”.

The judge called the Queensland-based speedrunner’s actions a “crusade” against Billy, who was trying to show his audience that he was a “knight who slew the Mitchell dragon.” In the wake of the verdict, Karl Jobst issued a statement on the social media platform X.

“I lost. The judge found Billy to be a credible witness and believed his entire testimony. From that point on unfortunately, there was really nothing that could have saved me. I will now obviously consider my options. I know many of you will be upset with this and I am sorry for that,” he wrote.

Karl Jobst also thanked his supporters and pledged to “work as hard” as he could and “repay” everything he “owed” to his followers. In a follow-up post, he also addressed the “lies” being circulated against him and claimed he never intended to “hide” the reason behind Billy’s lawsuit against him.

He shared a link to one of his YouTube videos from August 2023, where William accused him of “fraud.”

“In this video I fully allow Billy to explain why he was suing me. And I specifically state that I chose not to go into too much detail because it related to the ongoing lawsuit. Furthermore, I never asked for money when Billy originally sued me,” Karl Jobst wrote in his recent tweet.

“It was only after he sent me a 2nd lawsuit and a threat of a 3rd lawsuit which were completely unrelated that I needed to crowdfund. My total legal costs are well over $600k, so any money I received went to my lawyers. I did not intentionally try to deceive anyone or trick anyone just to defraud them or scam them out of money,” the speedrunner added.

He also apologized for not being “more transparent,” adding he feared it would jeopardize his defense. Karl Jobst concluded by writing that his claims about Apollo Legend were based on “incorrect information from multiple sources,” and not intentional lies.

“I retracted the statements once I confirmed it was inaccurate but apparently it was not sufficient. At some point of course I will produce a video discussing everything, and I still believe the decision today was not the correct one,” Karl Jobst wrapped.

---

In brief, looking at Billy Mitchell’s reputation over the years

It is noteworthy that the court on Tuesday ruled solely on the defamation suit, and its summary clarified that it wasn’t called upon to pass judgment on whether William Mitchell was guilty of cheating and fraud.

Billy Mitchell has won his lawsuit against Karl Jobst. (Image via Instagram)

Meanwhile, Billy has previously been investigated by the video game database Twin Galaxies. This was after he was accused of cheating in his Donkey Kong world records in 2017 by reportedly using emulation software instead of original arcade hardware. Twin Galaxies subsequently removed his scores and shunned him from contesting in the future.

The Guinness World Records disqualified Mitchell as a multiple world record holder, only to reinstate them in June 2020. Later, he sued Twin Galaxies in the USA and settled in January 2024.

As part of the settlement, the organization issued a statement that, as per an expert’s opinion, “the gameplay on the tapes of Mr. Mitchell’s record game plays could depict play on an original unmodified Donkey Kong arcade hardware if the hardware involved was malfunctioning, likely due to the degradation of components”.

Twin Galaxies further mentioned that it would remove any dispute regarding William’s records and reinstate his previous scores on its website’s database.