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One thing I am curious about with this whole Gawker lawsuit and in particular the Thiel funding, is did he really outlay cash to the attorneys or did he tell th

One thing I am curious about with this whole Gawker lawsuit and in particular the Thiel funding, is did he really outlay cash to the attorneys or did he tell the attorneys to pursue the case at whatever expense. In many cases like this a court award is going to include attorney fees/expenses, with attorneys working on contingency. Now I understand that in many cases even a "win" does not guarantee the attorneys will get the full amount for their fees/expenses, but often they will get a third of the award. I would be curious to know what the exact fee/expense arrangement was in the case of the Hogan/Thiel attorneys. The impression that I get, and I could be completely wrong, is that Thiel basically associated his name with it to keep Gawker from throwing high-priced attorneys at Hogan and having Hogan submit to a settlement when he could potentially win more. There was no real exchange of money between Thiel and the attorneys though. Again, could be completely wrong, so I am curious. Sorry to go off on a tangent there, but I wanted to lay out a little context. Since many attorneys operate on contingency, how much of market is there to actually "fund" a lawsuit?

will_brown 10y ago
I can't answer the specifics of the Thiel/Bollea deal. But there are rules so whatever the deal is, we at least know the boundaries. One of the most important is that any third party funding a lawsuit can not interfere with the independence of the attorney-client relationship (that's a term of art, but there are many examples and actually cases to guide a lawyers behavior). In Florida our contingency rule is 33% max pretrial and 40% max thereafter. There are other caps on different types of cases (i.e. Class actions). One of the reasons contingency is so popular, I suppose like healthcare, people can't normally fund large lawsuits out of pocket. So while contingency helps people who otherwise could not afford lawsuits, it also has the consequence of lawyers being more selective on cases (so even winners might get passed, because a lawyer could theoretically lose money winning). Answer? A platform like mine could really open the door to hybrid contingency/billable cases which is currently rarely used, but would be a great incentive for lawyers to take cases they might otherwise not be able to take financially.
- jeffmould 10y ago
  Makes sense. The problem I see is that we already have a litigious society. The one plus to lawyers being selective is that while they may miss a few lawsuits, it reduces the number of frivolous lawsuits, which opens a liability to the attorney if they are found the be filing lawsuits just to file. In a way the idea is kind of a spin-off of structured payment lending which is a proven market. Personally I wouldn't invest, the risk is to great and the investment could be tied up for years with a better than average chance of little to no return. That said, it is an interesting concept, and part of me does see some benefit. I think the problem to solve would be to sell the platform to potential plaintiffs. There are probably numerous valid lawsuits that do not get brought because the plaintiff thinks it will cost them a fortune to even talk to an attorney in the first place. Put aside healthcare/accident related claims, but I am thinking more employer related lawsuits.
ksherlock 10y ago
The Peter Thiel connection wasn't known until after the trial was over. Key phrase from the NY Times article[1]: "What the jury — and the public — did not know was that Mr. Bollea had a secret benefactor paying about $10 million for the lawsuit: Peter Thiel". 1. http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/26/business/dealbook/peter-thiel-tech-billionaire-reveals-secret-war-with-gawker.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/26/business/dealbook/peter-th...

will_brown 10y ago

I can't answer the specifics of the Thiel/Bollea deal. But there are rules so whatever the deal is, we at least know the boundaries. One of the most important is that any third party funding a lawsuit can not interfere with the independence of the attorney-client relationship (that's a term of art, but there are many examples and actually cases to guide a lawyers behavior). In Florida our contingency rule is 33% max pretrial and 40% max thereafter. There are other caps on different types of cases (i.e. Class actions). One of the reasons contingency is so popular, I suppose like healthcare, people can't normally fund large lawsuits out of pocket. So while contingency helps people who otherwise could not afford lawsuits, it also has the consequence of lawyers being more selective on cases (so even winners might get passed, because a lawyer could theoretically lose money winning). Answer? A platform like mine could really open the door to hybrid contingency/billable cases which is currently rarely used, but would be a great incentive for lawyers to take cases they might otherwise not be able to take financially.

jeffmould 10y ago
Makes sense. The problem I see is that we already have a litigious society. The one plus to lawyers being selective is that while they may miss a few lawsuits, it reduces the number of frivolous lawsuits, which opens a liability to the attorney if they are found the be filing lawsuits just to file. In a way the idea is kind of a spin-off of structured payment lending which is a proven market. Personally I wouldn't invest, the risk is to great and the investment could be tied up for years with a better than average chance of little to no return. That said, it is an interesting concept, and part of me does see some benefit. I think the problem to solve would be to sell the platform to potential plaintiffs. There are probably numerous valid lawsuits that do not get brought because the plaintiff thinks it will cost them a fortune to even talk to an attorney in the first place. Put aside healthcare/accident related claims, but I am thinking more employer related lawsuits.

ksherlock 10y ago

The Peter Thiel connection wasn't known until after the trial was over. Key phrase from the NY Times article[1]: "What the jury — and the public — did not know was that Mr. Bollea had a secret benefactor paying about $10 million for the lawsuit: Peter Thiel". 1. http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/26/business/dealbook/peter-thiel-tech-billionaire-reveals-secret-war-with-gawker.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/26/business/dealbook/peter-th...