S01.E15: Game Face

[GHScorpiosRule]

2 hours ago, bunnyface said:

but I've always had the impression the attorneys got about half of whatever the settlement was

Unless the laws have changed, the firm gets a third, not half of the settlement.

[possibilities]

Senior telling Olympia that he was pleased that she won instead of settling, to me says the firm gets a huge payout. All he cares about is $$.

[mostlylurking]

On 3/14/2025 at 9:08 AM, DanaK said:

I wasn’t expecting the archivist to be the redditor, but it makes sense given she sees a lot of documents

Once they started talking about rules, I started to think it was her.  She’s all about rules.

I think Allie asking out Molly “as friends” was adorable.

[Percysowner]

Taking the high end idea that the firm takes 50% that leave $35 million to be distributed between 1000 plaintiffs. Each one gets $35,000 not as much as they could have if they had sued individually, but they get it without having to do any work. As others have said the firm usually only gets 33%, but 50% was easier for me to calculate, but the victims would have gotten more than the $35,000. Plus, if they want to go it on their own, they don't sign onto the settlement, hire their own lawyers and take their chances.

[Dowel Jones]

Just out of curiosity, and please excuse me for general ignorance as I did not see the pilot episode, but who are Jacobsen and Moore?  None of the partners carry that name.  Are they just investors in the firm?

[GHScorpiosRule]

2 minutes ago, Dowel Jones said:

Just out of curiosity, and please excuse me for general ignorance as I did not see the pilot episode, but who are Jacobsen and Moore?  None of the partners carry that name.  Are they just investors in the firm?

Probably the initial partners of the firm/individuals who set up the firm. Like the firm I work at? The two partners that set it up, have since passed away.

[possibilities]

My understanding is that the 1000 are the original people who signed on, but not the entire pool of beneficiaries. You need a certain number of plaintiffs to certify a class action.

But after that, the class is opened up to anyone who was affected by the wrongful action, and that can be millions of people.

They notify potential beneficiaries after the judgment. I have been notified three times of cases I had no knowledge of until after they settled. Each time, they determined I was eligible because of having been subject to whatever the illegal behavior was.

With product liability, it can be "everyone who took that drug or bought that product or used that software" [or whatever it is that the company in question did wrong].

In every case, I got very little money, like I said before. I think this is pretty common.

Edited March 18 by possibilities

[GHScorpiosRule]

2 minutes ago, possibilities said:

My understanding is that the 1000 are the original people who signed on, but not the entire pool of beneficiaries. You need a certain number of plaintiffs to certify a class action. But after that, the class is opened up to anyone who was affected by the wrongful action, and that can be millions of people. 

But they have to respond/agree within a set period of time-it's call the notice period. If they fail, then they're shit out of luck. In the real world.

[possibilities]

1 hour ago, GHScorpiosRule said:

But they have to respond/agree within a set period of time-it's call the notice period. If they fail, then they're shit out of luck. In the real world.

Yes, but ithe notices I've gotten have been sent out AFTER the settlement is determined-- so the big bucks Olympia just won is the total they will pay, but how many people it's divided by may soar well over the original 1000. 

[Nashville]

SPOILER ALERT: Great American Novel follows.  🙄

 

So - before I get into my potential scenario, let’s think about what we already know (or presume to know):

1. In the course of an opioid-related case brought against Wellbrexa, counsel for the defense came across a document; contents of the document are currently unknown, but potentially carried sufficient legal weight to swing judgment against the defendant.
2. This document was hidden from discovery during an opioid-related Wellbrexa case, in violation of a judge’s disclosure order; the manner of concealment is unknown, but (for reasons not yet known) the document was not immediately destroyed.
3. The court case proceeded, with nobody (outside a certain member or members of the defense team) any wiser to the document’s existence or impact - end result being victory for Wellbrexa and its defense team.
4. At some point after the final verdict in the case, another J&M staffer - our whistleblower, now presumed to be Ms. Belvin - stumbled across the document and recognized its importance; for reasons not yet explained, however, she did not immediately go public.
5. At some point in time, motivations of either guilt or artifice prompt Belvin to start posting about the document’s existence on Reddit; the post(s) do not explicitly cite the source document, but do make clear its legal significance.
6. Someone in the Maddy clan reads Reddit, and ran across Belvin’s post(s).

So, what to take away from this?  Here’s what I came up with:

• The document may have presented significant danger to Wellbrexa’s case, but it also presented significant value to J&M - which is why it was hidden, rather than destroyed.
• The document had to be hidden in a way such that odds of accidental exposure were minimal, but it could be easily retrieved if needed; not only that, a place where the culprit AND ONLY the culprit could, if caught retrieving the document, easily explain away their presence/access to the hiding spot - while any other employee of the firm would be paranoid as hell to attempt such access for fear of exposure.
• The hiding place was accessible to the initial culprit(s) on the J&M team, but it was also accessible (by accident or intention) to Belvin.

With all that in mind, here’s my initial supposition(s):

1. The culprit in this case was either Senior (most likely), or (less likely) one of the J&M staff who worked both the relevant Wellbrexa lawsuit and at least one of Senior’s numerous divorces (more explanation forthcoming).
2. The culprit hid the incriminating document in the perfect place to hide such: square in the middle of a few million other documents - namely, the J&M case file archives - and, more specifically, an archive box relating to a closed case virtually anybody else in the firm would avoid like the plague: one of Senior’s past divorces.
3. The document said undisturbed for an indeterminate number of years, until it was run across by the one person OTHER than the associated legal team likely to do a deep dive into a box related to an obsolete case: the records and archives administrator - Belvin - whose job would entail periodic review of old records to determine the need for continued retention vs. destruction or disposal.
4. (3b, really): It’s also entirely possible Belvin was specifically directed to destroy the archive box in question, but discovered the Wellbrexa document(s) sandwiched in between the other relevant files.
5. In either case Belvin immediately recognized the significance of not only the document but also its hiding place, which threatened immediate peril to her career - and possibly more, depending upon what L&M memoranda or such may have been attached to the original Wellbrexa document.
6. Frightened into inaction, Belvin sat on the document until her conscience began getting the best of her.
7. Belvin posted a description of the Wellbrexa document on Reddit, but kept it vague enough to protect herself.

So far as i can tell, this covers all points except the swipe of Julian’s card at the ladies room - which makes me wonder: if #4/3b was the case, mightn’t the card swipe have been evidence of Belvin (with Julian’s card) preserving the document from destruction?

 

Discuss.  😉

[ItCouldBeWorse]

On 3/13/2025 at 10:09 PM, johntfs said:

Am I the only thinking that Sarah and Simone are going to hate-fuck at some point?

Sarah said she could imagine sticking her tongue down Simone's throat and Billy said "ew", so Sarah's thought of it.

On 3/14/2025 at 10:08 AM, DanaK said:

It’s not clear to me if Slamm’d just paid money or is taking the product off the market

Yup.  If they had settled earlier as Senior wished, it would not be off the market.  No mention after the final settlement as to that "detail."

Btw, no reputable lawyer/law firm settles a case because it's best for the firm.  The ethical requirement is to do what is best for the client.  That's lawyering 101. Even if the firm does something different, they're not so blatant about it.  Senior should have said that there was a risk the plaintiffs would get nothing if they went to verdict, but this way the clients would get a decent amount AND the firm would cover their costs.

On 3/17/2025 at 7:06 PM, Chicago Redshirt said:

At a guess (and it's just a guess because I've never done class-action work for either side), the plaintiff's firm would be able to recover its costs in bringing the suit and its expenses in administering the distribution of the remaining funds.

Let's say for funsies that the firm is going to claim that it's spent $3 million pursuing the case thus far. Let's say that it gets to shave another $7 million off the top for fees and its future costs for administering the class.  

That leaves $30 million to be distributed to the actual plaintiffs.

Although they already have 1,000 people who have signed up for the class, presumably they are obligated to advertise the settlement to see if others are eligible. It's unclear to me what the actual "class" is supposed to be: any consumers who have had medical or other issues after having drunk Slamm'd? Consumers of Slamm'd who are under 21?

Anyway, let's say with the proper advertising, they end up with 10,000 claimants on the class. That means each of them gets $3k if they opt in. 

Of course, if you had a particularized injuries nothing would stop you from not signing onto the class and suing on your own.

On 3/18/2025 at 9:17 AM, bunnyface said:

Yeah, the only time I've gotten a card to be a part of a class action suit, the payout was just a few dollars.  I don't have actual facts, but I've always had the impression the attorneys got about half of whatever the settlement was and then the rest is distributed to the class.  So it doesn't normally break down to much for the "victims."  

After recovering expenses, the law firm gets roughly 1/3 of the remaining settlement/award.  Can be somewhat higher or lower, but it's not 50%.  And not every member of the class gets the same amount; lead plaintiffs with greater damages would receive more.  Otherwise, there's not much incentive for the more gravely impacted to be part of the class, and they are the ones who presumably make the best witnesses, so are the most valuable to the class.

I suppose if you add in expenses and the contingency amount, it could easily reach 50%, but without a law firm willing to advance the fees for expert witnesses, etc., there'd be no recovery at all.  Only the contingency amount represents profit for the law firm.  So if Senior was happy to simply recover costs, the settlement amount must have been barely more than the expenses.  I'm not sure why a judge would have signed off on that. (The judge doesn't care about the risk of the law firm not recovering their costs.)

On 3/18/2025 at 4:05 PM, Dowel Jones said:

Just out of curiosity, and please excuse me for general ignorance as I did not see the pilot episode, but who are Jacobsen and Moore?  None of the partners carry that name.  Are they just investors in the firm?

You can't invest in a law firm.  Generally speaking, the American Bar Association's rules of ethics require that you  be a lawyer to have an ownership interest.  There was some nonsense in the original Suits about Donna (a senior legal secretary) becoming a partner in the firm where she worked, which could never have happened.

There are now some specific exceptions in a few jurisdictions:   https://www.thomsonreuters.com/en-us/posts/legal/practice-innovations-april-2022-non-lawyer-ownership/ ,

but not in NY, where both Suits and Matlock were/are set, and not in the structure of a big firm.

Speaking of Suits, if Olympia does form her own firm, Maddie should join her only if she wants to bring the firm down, because although she is an attorney, she is practicing under false credentials, calling into question the validity of every deal or trial she's been part of.

 

 

Edited Thursday at 12:52 AM by ItCouldBeWorse

[DanaK]

13 hours ago, Nashville said:

SPOILER ALERT: Great American Novel follows.  🙄

 

So - before I get into my potential scenario, let’s think about what we already know (or presume to know):

1. In the course of an opioid-related case brought against Wellbrexa, counsel for the defense came across a document; contents of the document are currently unknown, but potentially carried sufficient legal weight to swing judgment against the defendant.
2. This document was hidden from discovery during an opioid-related Wellbrexa case, in violation of a judge’s disclosure order; the manner of concealment is unknown, but (for reasons not yet known) the document was not immediately destroyed.
3. The court case proceeded, with nobody (outside a certain member or members of the defense team) any wiser to the document’s existence or impact - end result being victory for Wellbrexa and its defense team.
4. At some point after the final verdict in the case, another J&M staffer - our whistleblower, now presumed to be Ms. Belvin - stumbled across the document and recognized its importance; for reasons not yet explained, however, she did not immediately go public.
5. At some point in time, motivations of either guilt or artifice prompt Belvin to start posting about the document’s existence on Reddit; the post(s) do not explicitly cite the source document, but do make clear its legal significance.
6. Someone in the Maddy clan reads Reddit, and ran across Belvin’s post(s).

So, what to take away from this?  Here’s what I came up with:

• The document may have presented significant danger to Wellbrexa’s case, but it also presented significant value to J&M - which is why it was hidden, rather than destroyed.
• The document had to be hidden in a way such that odds of accidental exposure were minimal, but it could be easily retrieved if needed; not only that, a place where the culprit AND ONLY the culprit could, if caught retrieving the document, easily explain away their presence/access to the hiding spot - while any other employee of the firm would be paranoid as hell to attempt such access for fear of exposure.
• The hiding place was accessible to the initial culprit(s) on the J&M team, but it was also accessible (by accident or intention) to Belvin.

With all that in mind, here’s my initial supposition(s):

1. The culprit in this case was either Senior (most likely), or (less likely) one of the J&M staff who worked both the relevant Wellbrexa lawsuit and at least one of Senior’s numerous divorces (more explanation forthcoming).
2. The culprit hid the incriminating document in the perfect place to hide such: square in the middle of a few million other documents - namely, the J&M case file archives - and, more specifically, an archive box relating to a closed case virtually anybody else in the firm would avoid like the plague: one of Senior’s past divorces.
3. The document said undisturbed for an indeterminate number of years, until it was run across by the one person OTHER than the associated legal team likely to do a deep dive into a box related to an obsolete case: the records and archives administrator - Belvin - whose job would entail periodic review of old records to determine the need for continued retention vs. destruction or disposal.
4. (3b, really): It’s also entirely possible Belvin was specifically directed to destroy the archive box in question, but discovered the Wellbrexa document(s) sandwiched in between the other relevant files.
5. In either case Belvin immediately recognized the significance of not only the document but also its hiding place, which threatened immediate peril to her career - and possibly more, depending upon what L&M memoranda or such may have been attached to the original Wellbrexa document.
6. Frightened into inaction, Belvin sat on the document until her conscience began getting the best of her.
7. Belvin posted a description of the Wellbrexa document on Reddit, but kept it vague enough to protect herself.

So far as i can tell, this covers all points except the swipe of Julian’s card at the ladies room - which makes me wonder: if #4/3b was the case, mightn’t the card swipe have been evidence of Belvin (with Julian’s card) preserving the document from destruction?

 

Discuss.  😉

Interesting theories. It’s possible though that it was archivist Belvin who hid the document in an unlikely place instead of the culprit in order to keep it hidden until she decided what to do with it

[Nashville]

3 hours ago, DanaK said:

Interesting theories. It’s possible though that it was archivist Belvin who hid the document in an unlikely place instead of the culprit in order to keep it hidden until she decided what to do with it

I debated back & forth on that question: upon finding the incriminating document, WWBD?

1. Immediately move the document to a new hiding place of B’s own choosing - to secure it from future retrieval and use (or possible destruction) by the original culprit?
2. Leave the document where B found it - to avoid raising the original culprit’s suspicions or otherwise spooking them, should they be checking on the document occasionally to ensure its continued security?

Actually… upon reflection, I think I’d go with Option 3: 😉

1. Retrieve the original document.
2. Make a metric shit-ton of copies - or several, at least.
3. Use one copy to replace the original document in the culprit’s selected hiding place.
4. Re-hide the original in a different hiding place of B’s own selection.

This course of action would protect the original document from loss / theft / destruction, while preserving - against a cursory examination, at least - the culprit’s illusions of the original document’s continued security.

 

* What Would Belvin Do?