Figure Four Weekly 3/21/2016: Hulk Hogan awarded $115 million by jury (Sort of)
The trial of Hulk Hogan vs. Gawker Media, Nick Denton, and A.J. Daulerio (who we’ll collectively call “Gawker” unless we need to be more specific) turned out to be quite possibly even more of a circus than anyone even could have imagine, as of this writing, it resulted in Hogan being awarded $115 million in compensatory damages with punitive damages still to come. The jury split the compensatory damages as $60 million in emotional damagers and $55 million in lost wages, with the latter number determined in large part from how much Hogan claimed he would have made if he had decided to market the video. He most likely won’t get close to that, if anything. There’s a question of exactly what Gawker will need to do to appeal, as Florida has various laws relating to posting a bond to secure the award when filing an appeal. There are alternatives, but the options including Gawker trying to stay the bond with the trial judge (unlikely given Judge Campbell’s rulings up to this point), posting the maximum allowed $50 million bond, or having to hire a bond company and paying about $12 million so the bond company can post $50 million.
Current subscribers click here to continue reading.