Free Speech, Due Process and Trial by Jury
The plaintiff's attorney, Mikal C. Watts, on cross-examination of the insurers' lead witness, attacked his investigator's thoroughness and his conclusions as hardly indisputable.
The multistate predatory lending and fraud litigation pitting more than a million low-income plaintiffs against two Fort Worth financial tech companies – Think Finance and Elevate Credit – is in “its final chapter,” lawyers told a U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Harlan Hale Wednesday. Elevate agreed to pay $33 million to settle three class actions and an adversarial bankruptcy complaint that alleged a decadelong scheme of predatory lending and subsequent corporate transactional legal maneuvering that claimed victims in nearly every state.
Fort Worth technology-based financial lender Elevate Credit has agreed to pay $33 million as part of a proposed settlement agreement related to a web of litigation across the United States, which alleged a decade-long scheme of predatory lending and subsequent corporate transactional legal maneuvering that victimized more than a million low-income people.
Energy trial litigator Lauren Brogdon was on maternity leave last year when she started “reflecting on the future growth” of her law practice and the right “environment” where she wanted to practice. Last week, the Houston lawyer moved her practice to Haynes and Boone. In an exclusive interview, Brogdon told The Texas Lawbook the reasons behind her lateral move, the biggest litigation risks she sees for energy companies today and her passion for pro bono.
Is Eduardo Rosendi dead or alive? Was he a Mexican tech CEO worth $70 million or a custodian who earned $12 a day? Those are the $26 million questions brought by two of the world’s largest insurance companies, a question they will put before a federal jury in Houston next week. “It’s the most interesting trial I have ever been involved in,” said trial lawyer Mikal C. Watts of San Antonio.
For 11 months, hundreds of wrongful-death, personal-injury and property-damage lawsuits seeking billions of dollars in damages related to Winter Storm Uri edged along at a snail’s pace. But a Houston judge appointed to oversee the litigation has put strict new deadlines on the lawyers who suddenly find themselves in the midst of a make-or-break few months that could determine the legitimacy and survival of their lawsuits. The Texas Lawbook has the details.
Randy Sorrels, the lawyer for Ulysses Cruz, his wife, and their 2 children, said they’ll consent to the $117.5 million remittitur – but will seek the full jury verdict if the other side appeals.
Tellurian co-founder Charif Souki went on the record with The Texas Lawbook in response to a lawsuit filed against him a couple weeks ago by a Tellurian investor that claims he lost tens-of-millions after Souki reneged on a promise to pay back the shareholder’s losses. Souki has retained Yetter Coleman in Houston to defend him in the litigation.
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