In terms of Erin Andrews new Marriott she’s about to own, I’d be happy to stay there. I’m sure the security is top notch.
Think that @busdriver11 raises a very good point when she speaks of the “psychology” of jurors. Let’s not forget there were 7 women on that jury - no one had to convince them that this experience would be beyond humiliating for most women. The defense could have simply shown them the increases in her income without making any connection to this incident. They could have even attributed it to her talent and increased experience over the years. That line of argument would have still proven their point of no economic damages. I think they came down too hard on her and may have rubbed jurors the wrong way. Of course hindsight is always 20/20.
The other 5 jurors were men. Most men I know like Erin Andrews a lot. Considering that she was the innocent victim here in every sense of the word, they are going to have a lot of sympathy for her. I think the men on that jury were probably angered by what happened to her and wanted accountability.
I agree with other posters that $75 million is a lot - so is $55 million. But how do you put a value on the damages when the video will never go away? She will be dealing with this for the rest of her life. Let’s see what she ends up with at the end of the day after the appeal. And who knows if there is a cap on their insurance policy and if this Windsor Group has sufficient funds to make up for any shortfall.
And of course lets not forget that her attorney will likely get 1/3 of whatever the final award is.
Carolinamom said the defense blamed the victim. That’s false.
Edited to take out insulting language. Also, the defense did bring up that her career was very successful after the incident, that she suffered neither economic nor emotional harm. That could be interpreted as a kind of victim blaming. - Fallenchemist
I happen to be on Erin Andrews side and I am glad the decision was for a large amount.
That said I appreciate Momofwildchilds analysis as an attorney and resident of the area. I think many here are taking her opinion the wrong way in this and seem to be gleefully goad her about the decision.
Very wise words tom1944
Unless someone is an owner of a business and has the realization that your entire life’s work, and your ability to support your family can be taken away in an instant as a result of something completely out of your control you will not have an appreciation for the implications and magnitude of an award like this.
I am entirely sensitive to Ms.Andrews emotional pain, without question! In my opinion a 55 million dollar award is indicative of the jury having no grasp of reality, economic or otherwise.
Well the point made by the jury was that it was in the business’ control.
It is pretty obvious the jury was sending a message. No one really expects that Erin will get that amount of $. The perp has no $ and it’s possible the judge will set aside that verdict and they (Erin and the hotel) will negotiate a new amount (paraphrasing what was said on The Today Show this morning). The just reported that Erin will speak out. The news is saying the defense is still deciding if they will appeal.
The defense did a terrible job, period. And the investors should have settled but they were greedy. My father was a 1/4 owner with 3 other partners in the largest franchisee of a major fast food chain (over 250 stores, plus other restaurant chains and a movie theater chain.) They were sued all the time - and I know this because I worked for the company for 5 years and my father was Corporate Counsel. We settled all the time because it’s very expensive not to and can be a PR nightmare - even though the company had very deep pockets.
My favorite case was that of a patron who stubbed their toe and we got sued for pain and suffering plus the patron’s spouse sued us for loss of conjungal rights. Yes, we settled.
I worked for a PI lawyer for a year when I had quit teaching and was trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my life. Almost every document I typed had these words in it: “The defendant knew or should have known…”
The attorney I worked for didn’t have the time to litigate many of his cases. He always tried to get a settlement. He did strike it rich with some Prozac suits that went to trial, however. But settling out of court was always the preferred outcome.
I just find the whole thing depressing. There are plenty of people wronged out there that will not get an award anywhere near this amount. For example the people of Flint who are going to have to deal with the lead problem for the rest of their lives, they don’t have much money to start with and they will probably get squat. Hopefully she will donate a large portion of her award to some sort of charity.
A couple of comments. First, this is why you put a huge number in your complaint. You might get it, or something near it. Also, jurors are not necessarily ignorant–they may be well aware that the plaintiff will have to settle for less, and that her lawyer will get a big chunk of the award. They probably know that the individual perpetrator is not likely to have any money. So they may have knowingly inflated the award so that after all is said and done, the plaintiff will get big payout. If you were the hotel defendants, how much would you offer now to settle the case pending appeal? It’s sure not 50 grand. They rolled the dice and lost on the amount of the recovery.
As far as the defense, they were in a bind. I haven’t seen the details, but perhaps they knew that they were likely to lose on the question of liability. If so, they had to try to reduce damages. However, it sounds like they didn’t handle it very well, and it backfired on them. Perhaps they should have agreed that it was emotionally traumatic, but asked for more details on how it affected her finances. I’m sure they didn’t mean to hint that the incident helped her financially, but perhaps they said something that gave that impression.
“I hope we are all ready to pay the price for these protections. I work for a large company that does its best to protect our employees and our customers. However, a single employee can make a mistake or be just a bad person. Things happen. You can not protect against every single thing. It just can’t be done.”
There is truth to that, but the law also has standards on what constitutes negligent behavior. It all depends on the circumstances and what the company did to try and prevent incidents like this from happening. For example, in the financial industry they have safeguards in place to try and detect wrongful acts by employees and to make clear what a wrongful act is. For example, we have to take manadatory training each year on issues like money laundering and doing business with countries with sanctions against them. A lot of financial firms require people who could embezzle to take vacations, where they can check and make sure they aren’t hiding malfeasance. The reason they do this is because if for example an employee does do business with a country with sanctions against it,and they didn’t do this, they would have no defense. Likewise, if companies don’t have in place compliance controls and policies liked forced vacations and the like, and there is massive fraud, they can and will be held liable for not having those procedures. In trading, companies spend a lot of money and time on compliance and on risk prevention, to monitor what is going on, because if they don’t have those controls, and there is wrongful trading found, the company will face a much bigger penalty for not having even tried to prevent such things.
It comes down to looking at something that happened and saying could the defendent have reasonably tried to prevent what happened. In this case, the jury felt the hotel owner was lax in security, that having the house phone publicly accessible like that was a foreseeable breach.
As far as juries go, of course they go by emotion, lawyers in jury selection know that, and they appeal to the emotions of jurors all the time. The idea that somehow the law is always based on fact and logical reasoning doesn’t always hold true. A jury sees a young kid who has been badly burned in a fire, and the parents sue claiming that the clothing they were wearing wasn’t fire retardent enough, and even though the manufacturer abided by all then current regulations, they could still end up with a substantial award from a jury (what a judge would do is unknown, of course). I have been on civil juries, and the plaintiff’s attorney definitely appealed to the emotions, I was on an auto accident case that was pathetic, the plaintiff alleged all kinds of injuries from a low speed collision, and the plaintiff was this older woman, who had obviously worked hard all her life, was timeworn, and was looking for a substantial payout so she could retire. The plaintiff’s lawyer had her talk about how she had rotator cuff damage, and 'wouldn’t be able to play with her grandchildren any more" (said grandchildren were in their mid to late teens), they brought the husband on the stand to talk about the impact on him, it is the old term, ‘playing it to the jury’. And yep, I am sure Andrew’s laywer played to the jury, too, played up the emotional trauma and so forth.
It is likely that the trial judge will cut down the jury award, if they don’t, an appeal court if they rule that the verdict was correct very well may as well. We hear about these mega awards, what we don’t hear about is what happens to them down the line, often it is not what is portrayed.
I doubt there was not a good faith effort to settle. Sometimes, the plaintiff will NOT settle for any reasonable amount. I want my day in court, period. I want the world to hear my story! The lawyer’s job is to provide the client with options; it is the client’s ultimate decision what to do with them. Ms. Andrews set the threshold really high and would not budge an inch, forcing the other side to go to court, because a settlement for that amount was unreasonable. She had a good story to tell the court. Do you think the jurors lived in a vacuum over the weekend? No matter what instructions the judge would give to the jury, in a high profile case like this, public opinion always has a say.
Let’s just imagine that the hotel defendants offered a million bucks to settle, and the plaintiff held out for ten million. I would consider those to be realistic, although the defendants might have offered a lot less. If that was where the negotiations broke down, then the verdict is a big win for the plaintiff. If that happened, negotiations would not resume at the same place they broke down before.
The defense is already threatening to declare bankruptcy.
And if they decide to appeal, I am pretty sure they will have to post a bond showing that they have sufficient assets to cover the award should they lose on appeal.
Did the jury award a big verdict?
In my experience, most juries are pretty savvy and usually make awards that align pretty well with the evidence. They all do their best and bring their common sense with them, trying not to be swayed by emotion and applying the facts to the law as it is presented and instructed. They are generally not “suckers” by any means. I have been impressed, sitting as a juror and also presenting to juries. They are very earnest.