(Reuters) - The grievance committee for the Southern District of New York has suspended Richard Liebowitz, a New York lawyer notorious for filing low-value copyright cases on behalf of photographers, from practicing law while it investigates charges against him.

The committee's chair, U.S. District Court Judge Katherine Polk Failla, wrote in a Monday order that the interim suspension was needed to "protect the public" because of Liebowitz's "unwillingness to change despite 19 formal sanctions and scores of other admonishments and warnings from judges across the country."

Liebowitz and his counsel, Brian Jacobs of Morvillo Abramowitz Grand Iason & Anello, did not immediately respond to request for comment on Tuesday.

Since 2017, Liebowitz has filed more than 1,000 lawsuits in the Southern District of New York, more than any other lawyer. U.S. District Judge Denise Cote in a 2018 decision called him a "copyright troll" – a lawyer who gets defendants to settle because that's a cheaper option than litigation.

Liebowitz has previously defended his business model, telling Slate in 2018 that he is protecting intellectual property rights.

In June, U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman in Manhattan fined Liebowitz for lying under oath.

Furman also ordered that, among other things, Liebowitz must share a copy of his June opinion and order with all clients and file it on the docket of pending cases, as well as on the docket of any new case brought within the next year.

But Liebowitz failed to file the opinion and order on at least 113 cases in which he was arguably required to do so, Furman wrote in an opinion on Monday, separate from the grievances committee's order. Furman said there was little point in further sanctions for Liebowitz, in part because of his suspension.

In the case before Furman, Liebowitz represented a photographer who snapped an image of musician Leon Redbone and demanded thousands of dollars in damages after a band used the image on a Facebook page to pay tribute to Redbone after his death.

The case settled in 2019. But Furman pushed ahead with sanctions against Liebowitz, defendant Bandshell Artist Management's counsel Brad Richard Newberg of McGuireWoods said Tuesday. Newberg, an intellectual property partner, said he took the case pro bono because he was aware of Liebowitz's reputation.

"I don't like any attorneys giving other attorneys a bad name," Newberg said. "But I especially didn't like it when it so directly affected the copyright bar."

(Jan Wolfe contributed to this report.)