Granted: sexual harassment is wrong, and we at Overlawyered do not approve of it. I have no reason to side with one party or the other in the he-said/she-said dispute in the lawsuit against Isiah Thomas, James Dolan, and the owners of the New York Knicks, MSG, though one questions the relevance of Stephon Marbury’s sexual exploits with a third party and whether that salacious testimony perhaps prejudiced the jury. But even if one agrees that everything Anucha Browne Sanders alleged occurred? Well, that $11.6 million award—which does not even include a penny of economic damages—is outrageous. Hey, I’ll let Isiah Thomas call me a bitch for a hundredth that amount. Given the Supreme Court’s command that punitive damages have some reasonable relationship to compensatory damages, it is hard to understand why a jury was allowed to make an eight-digit award when there has yet to be any compensatory damages established.
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{ 7 comments }
Mr. Frank,
You clearly have no comprehension of what sexual harrasment is about. Your statement that you “do not approve of it” followed by your stated desire to be be called “a bitch” by Isiah Thomas for a payment of $1.16mm, puncuates this fact.
You’re post is really disgraceful.
I hear it, Ted. But there’s something I’ve learned in my few years: juries want to give out lots of money. They like it. They feel powerful. They’d rather give money than not give money. Most jurors are regular people, and in situations like this, they see an opportunity for punishment, to exercise some power, what have you. The bias is in favor of big awards. That’s not to say they always hand plaintiffs a win, it’s just what they prefer to do, I think. Most jurors also only serve once or twice, so why not do it up with a bang?
I’m sorry to say, but I think some jurors don’t even quite understand that they don’t HAVE to give money. Some, I am convinced, think of the trial as “that little show the lawyers do before we deliberate on how many millions the plaintiff should get.” Never mind the burden of proof, the jury instructions, etc.
The problem, as you say, is that there’s no relationship between an amount of money that high and the “crime” committed. If we had professional jurors who handled case after case, they’d probably begin to see the folly of awarding every litigant eight figures. That’s one idea for reform. Another is statutory limits on punitives and on “pain and suffering,” for instance. Anthony Sebok of Brooklyn Law School – not really a tort reformer, by the way – has mentioned how the Germans actually have charts for how much you can get for various body parts and/or injuries. Cold, sure, but an idea.
Mr. FraudPI,
I agree with Ted. In fact, why don’t you put your money where you big mouth is? I’ll see your $1.6 Million, Ted, and go down to $160,000, and Mr. Fraud can call me a bastard, which is just more appropriate.
I’ll also let you beat me, whip me, and make me write bad checks!
Looking forward to this mutually beneficial relationship, I remain,
Mr. Tkuti Mbutibubba,
Nigeria, oops,
Dave Lincoln,
America
Comment 1: “Mr. Frank, You clearly have no comprehension of what sexual harrasment is about.”
FraudPI: Do you have any “comprehension” of how much $11.6 million is?
On NPR this morning, they said that the $11.6 million did include a couple million in compensatory damages: she was fired from her $250K job and will probably never work in the industry again.
Rebecca, the New York Times says that the $11.6 million is solely punitive damages and that the plaintiffs are asking for a separate $9.6 million in compensatory damages (which would reflect the present value of over a century’s worth of wage differentials, since Sanders is working in the industry for six digits). It’s possible that they’re wrong, and NPR is correct, but they provided a pretty explicit breakdown of the damages.
Separately, I’ll note that $11.6 M divided by 100 is $116,000, and I can probably be negotiated down from there.
Anyone who likes can call me a bitch for the bargain price of $99,000. (I do have to admit that a number of those who read my newspaper column call me a bitch entirely without compensation, but I’m hoping to change that.)
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