In a stunning but not unexpected ruling today, Judge Irving of the DC Superior Court has reduced the unconstitutional punitive damages jury award against Mark from one million dollars to a mere $5,000.
Our brilliant legal counsel Christopher Bartolomucci reacted to the news, "We argued for Mark that the $1 million in punitive damages awarded by the D.C. jury was grossly excessive and unconstitutional. We are pleased that the Superior Court agreed, held that the award violated the Due Process Clause, and reduced it to $5,000."
Perhaps, Michael E. Mann's attempted bribe of a Supreme Court Justice was a tad premature?
I'll add a million dollars to that. https://t.co/b2dcYR4oak
— Prof Michael E. Mann (@MichaelEMann) February 19, 2024
Here's the state of the play...
Last February, a jury of Mark's "peers" in the fetid toilet of the DC court system found that Mann had not been damaged by Mark's blog post about Penn State corruption - awarding him only a dollar in nominal damages.
However, Mark was a longtime guest host for Rush Limbaugh and – according to Mann's lawyer - it was necessary to send a message not to mess with "climate scientists". So, the jury topped that $1 in nominal damages with one million dollars in punitive. Predictably, the mainstream media and climate cultists went gaga over it whilst anyone with a passing acquaintance of the law understood this award would not stand up.
However, the half million dollar judgment against Mann awarded to our co-defendant National Review (NR) appears to be holding up just fine...
Just a few weeks ago, Mann told the court he shouldn't have to pay as NR will be on the hook to pay the 1M verdict against Mark – or even more:
It is unclear why NRO, a multi-million dollar organization, is demanding immediate payment from a college professor, despite that professor already having received a favorable judgment against said organization's own writer. It is also undeniable that this very complex case is not at the end of review and that one of Dr. Mann's current appeals will implicate the issue of exactly who should pay the existing million-dollar verdict owed to Dr. Mann—which may be more upon retrial. Any request for immediate payment of $530,820.21 under these circumstances is unjustified and, more so, clear indication of spite and ill-will towards Dr. Mann...
So it looks like the math – no matter how he tries to manipulate it – is not working out for him so far.
As my old pal Andrew Grossman - counsel for co-defendants Rand Simberg and CEI tweeted:
He's already paid CEI more in sanctions than he won in the final judgment, and that's not counting the $530k in fees he owes to National Review and any fee award to CEI."
In addition to reducing the punitive award, the judge denied our motion for a new trial on the basis that:
Yet, the clearest support that the jury was not improperly influenced by Dr. Mann's misrepresentations is the jury verdict for one dollar in compensatory damages.
At trial, Mann presented false evidence to the judge and jury which gave the impression of nine million dollars in "lost" grant funding. [That is the subject of a still-pending sanctions motion.]
In his reasoning for not granting a new trial, the judge acknowledged Mann's false evidence but basically says - hey, no harm, no foul - the jury didn't believe it anyway....
(Unfortunately, the judge doesn't consider that perhaps the jury did believe the false 9M claim but did not consider it as compensatory damage as Mann would not have been the recipient in any event. All grant monies would have gone to Penn State, et al and they were not a party to the suit.)
And, as for the "send a message" problem, the judge punted to the Court of Appeals:
The D.C. Circuit has forbidden "send a message" arguments in order "to prevent the jury from deciding a case based on inappropriate considerations such as emotion[,]" ...while other courts have held "send a message" arguments to be "at best bad practice."...
The Court of Appeals, however, has yet to consider whether "send a message" arguments are allowable in punitive damage cases.
....Absent direction from the Court of Appeals, this Court cannot say that the closing arguments by Dr. Mann's counsel prejudiced the jury, especially in light of the remitted punitive damages award.
Mann has already filed with the Court of Appeals.
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