Soon after Hulk Hogan brought his original lawsuits in 2012, three state appeals court judges and a federal judge repeatedly ruled that Gawker’s post was newsworthy under the First Amendment. Gawker President and General Counsel Heather Dietrick issued the following statement Monday: "To any even casual observer of First Amendment rights, the outcome is perfectly clear." "The Hulk Hogan issue, other than comic value to me, is nothing more than a time and money question," Gawker board member Jason Epstein told Re/code’s Peter Kafka in January. In any event, Gawker’s leadership has appeared zen about the outcome of the trial, which they were certain didn’t look good for them before it got under way earlier this month. Shortly before the jury delivered its verdict on Friday, previously sealed records were released, indicating that what Hogan told FBI investigators appeared to contradict what he said during testimony in the trial. If Judge Campbell forces the company to pay $50 million (or a similarly high amount) up front, then the company plans to take its case to the Second District Court of Appeals, which has already reversed some of Campbell’s decisions.Īnother development worth paying attention to is what comes of the sealed FBI documents that Hogan’s lawyers successfully kept out of the trial.
Denton (who owns a controlling stake in Gawker Media) is worth $121 million, and Daulerio "has no assets but owes $27,000 in student loans."ĭenton told the New York Times last summer that Gawker doesn’t keep that kind of cash sitting around, but that doesn’t mean Gawker is totally screwed. In court, Gawker’s lawyers said that the company is worth $83 million. The bond amount could be up to $50 million, depending on what the judge rules. The bond is where things could start to get tricky for Gawker. Next, the company’s legal team will have to persuade Judge Pamela Campbell* to either release them from or greatly reduce the bond that Gawker would have to post before proceeding with its appeal.
This final ruling from the jury effectively marks the conclusion of stage one in the legal fight between the former professional wrestler and Gawker. Last Friday, the jury ruled that Gawker, Denton and Daulerio violated Hogan’s right to privacy when they released the tape of the ex-wrestler having sex with the then-wife of his best friend, Bubba "The Love Sponge" Clem. Daulerio, who published the blog post with the sex tape excerpt, has to pay $100,000. Founder and CEO Nick Denton must pay $10 million, and former editor A.J.
The jury ordered Gawker Media to pay $15 million in punitive damages. As for Cockburn, he mines his gossip much more carefully.In court on Monday, a jury ruled that in addition to the $115 million Hulk Hogan (real name, Terry Bollea) was awarded last week for the 2012 publication of his sex tape on, the ex-professional wrestler was entitled to more than $25 million in punitive damages. You think they would have learned their lesson. This raises a question: could the shoddy band of irony-slurping hacks known as Gawker get sued out of existence again? Cockburn recalls that Gawker ceased to exist between 20 after it was sued for defamation for publishing Hulk Hogan’s sex tape.
Her other articles include such thought-provoking gems as “An Exclusive Interview with Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s Chat Bot,” “Top 10 Assassinations,” and “ Sex Toy Collective Just Wants What’s Best for ‘The Believer.’”
The story a waste of space, though it surely displayed well the character of Gawker - as well as that of the author of the piece, Tarpley Hitt. We apologize for the error.” Then, perhaps after a call with their libel lawyer, they deleted it entirely. Gawker first posted a partial correction to the piece, stating merely that “We were tipped off that Thomas Chatterton Williams attended this premier.