Legal Commentary

Ward Churchill Wins Wrongful Termination Suit: $1.00 Damages

By Jeralyn

Jury finds Ward Churchill was only fired for his 9/11 essay. Damages: $1.00. CU will have to pay Churchill's attorney's fees. Still to be determined at separate hearing (not by the jury): Whether Churchill gets his job back or whether he gets lump-sum settlement instead.

Churchill attorney David Lane didn't ask the jury for money, but "to do justice." He says this is a vindication for the First Amendment and academic freedom and was never about money. But, as I said earlier, he will get attorney fees.

Great tweeting of the verdict (More twitter coverage here.) The local television coverage was dismal.[More....]

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The jury verdict in the Ward Churchill wrongful termination case is in and about to be read. Since the jury had a question earlier on damages, I'm assuming they found in his favor.

Apparently, one juror wanted to give him zero and was told he had to get at least $1.00. But that juror may have been a holdout:

In addition the jury also asked the judge whether, in light of the fact that apparently five of the six jurors have already decided on a dollar amount, could the jury conceivably ask for the lone holdout to be replaced with an alternate juror? Judge Naves again said no.

They are in the courtroom, reading the verdict.

Full post as published by TalkLeft on April 02, 2009 (boomark / email).