Many plaintiffs suing to collect damages have to hire lawyers on a contingency basis; the latter only get paid if they win the case. But many defendants being sued, including for cases of financial fraud and victimization, get to hire lawyers using any money they happen to have at the moment, even if whether some of that money is ill-gotten and really belongs to someone else is precisely what is at issue. So judges should be able to either put such payments on hold, or require tracking of any such monies paid, if there is a significant concern of such abuse. If the defendant wins, fine--the lawyers get paid. If not, they don't, or have to refund some of what they were paid (perhaps anything above some modest base amount).

I got this idea after hearing about all of R. Kelly's past & continuing expenses defending himself against sexual assault charges, money which could and should have gone to his victims.
-- scottinmn, Sep 30 2021

Litigation Funding https://www.ashurst...litigation-funding/
[calum, Sep 30 2021]

I despise lawyers. I'd bun this twice if I could.

My cousin is a good lawyer, she's the corporate type, nothing wrong with contract law.

She's the only good lawyer though.
-- doctorremulac3, Sep 30 2021


//Many plaintiffs suing to collect damages have to hire lawyers on a contingency basis; defense counsel only gets paid if they win the case.//
This is not the case in every jurisdiction and there are a range of ways to fund litigation that extend beyond no-win, no-fee. Link for a reasonable summary of the civil litigation funding options in England and Wales.

I am not 100% clear on the idea, though: is the proposal that lawyers for rich defendants should have a court mandated reduction in their fees if they lose, so that there is more money to be awarded in damages to the person who raised the action?
-- calum, Sep 30 2021


//She's the only good lawyer//

I have a friend who used to specialise in insolvency law. He once explained to me, regretfully, how, for lawyers, good people make bad clients and bad people make good clients. This is because good people only call a lawyer when they're in a desperate situation, whereas bad people game the system habitually, and they can pay because they're the ones stealing the money.

So I think I understand the motivation for the idea - to make representing bad people at least as risky as representing good people.

And notwithstanding [Calum]'s point about jurisdictional variation, [+].
-- pertinax, Sep 30 2021


Calum, yes that is what I meant. I misphrased the first sentence, which you quoted, and just fixed it. And I would only have this apply to cases where the origin (or destination) of the money is at issue, not to all cases involving rich defendants.
-- scottinmn, Oct 01 2021



random, halfbakery