Rossi vs. Darden developments [CASE CLOSED]

Quote from Eric Walker

From Vortex, Jones Beene's thought:

An interesting take. I'm not sure of its actual credibility, but it is nontheless interesting. If true, it would suggest that Rossi got nothing (unless his attorneys were VERY good at bluff).

Quote from THHuxleynew

Well, Rossi's attorney must have known this for a long time. I guess, on this reading, Rossi after listening to the opening statements may have had it brought home to him quite how much he would be crucified, and finally yield to persuasion from his attorney.

Brian,

Busy with some afterwork?

Your statement is nonsense. IH, the incompetents, have been played. They leaned on a one-sided contract, thought they could pressure Rossi out, but have been as incompetent in handling the case as they have been handling Rossi. This will cost them dearly.

Cheers,

JB

More thoughts later. But briefly:

Winners: IH, Rossi, & 3rd Party Defendents

Losers: Dewey, Maryyugo, Krivit, and Fred Z.

Consolation prize: Jed

Quote from oldguy

All claims and counterclaims withdrawn. Jury dismissed

http://coldfusioncommunity.net/

split the baby?????????????????????????????

Bummer. Millyuns of Quatloos down the drain, as nobody made a Bold Prediction of confidential settlement, most likely due to available "inside" sources (ahem Dewey).

In hindsight, settlement was the obvious choice, even despite conflicting information.

At least all sides commenting here (most likely) can agree that going forward, any entity partnering financially with Rossi for LENR+ has had their due diligence handed to them on the Docket, as it were, courtesy of IH, almost certainly at a cost (to IH) of 7 if not 8 figures.

It will be interesting what happens to the physical 1MW plant in Doral. If it appears back in North Carolina, reasonable assumptions are that IH retained ownership.

If Rossi refuses to mention any license opportunities or 'partners' in North America, we can assume IH retained those as well.

In fact, it will be interesting to hear Rossi's position on his future LENR+ roadmap. Like our current President's addiction to tweet, I don't think Rossi can resist commenting on JONP, and his sock puppets even more.

More drama to play out, but it seems we just witnessed the (anti) climax of this sorry tale.

Quote from PeterMetz

 

Yes if IH or Rossi ever go public would they not have to disclose certain things about this agreement? Even if they remain private? Maybe they can handle this In Perpetuam with NDA's. I don't know but I imagine so.

 

I think both sides have every reason to NDA the hell out of the settlement agreement. Unless that agreement goes belly-up and results in additional litigation, I seriously doubt that the details will fully become public. However, given the acumen IH demonstrated in signing the original license and Rossi's nature, there's probably a non-negligible chance of the agreement going belly-up.

Quote from IH Fanboy

Winners: IH, Rossi, & 3rd Party Defendents

Losers: Dewey, Maryyugo, Krivit, and Fred Z.

Consolation prize: Jed

Loser: The judicial system, confirmed focused on its belly button and incapable of understanding facts and concluding the obvious.

Winner: the lawyers, for the reason above

On to the next phase of the farce: spurious conclusions to be drawn about the significance of the settlement. But lack of meaningful information presents no impediment to confident pronouncements.

Quote from IH Fanboy

More thoughts later. But briefly:

Winners: IH, Rossi, & 3rd Party Defendents

Losers: Dewey, Maryyugo, Krivit, and Fred Z.

Consolation prize: Jed

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In another rare point of agreement, IHFB and I did not want a settlement because we (and many others) wanted to see the details, no matter how gory, that would come out publicly in trial.

So, I hate to say it, but as a member of the peanut gallery, unfortunately I think we have to add:

Losers: peanut gallery

But on the bright side:

Winners: peanut gallery, in that gallery member's discretionary time just increased a bunch!

Enjoy the summer, fellow peanuts!

Quote from Eric Walker

 

From Vortex, Jones Beene's thought:

 

I don't know. The ethical rules on client perjury are a quagmire. Basically, the rule of thumb is that a lawyer must not offer testimony that the lawyer knows for a fact is false. The lawyer may decline to offer testimony that the lawyer reasonably believes is false, and may seek the court's permission to withdraw if the lawyer reasonably believes the client will commit perjury, but the lawyer is also generally permitted to give the client every benefit of the doubt. So my take would be that unless Rossi volunteered to the lawyer that the whole heat exchanger thing was a lie, the lawyer is permitted to 'believe' the highly improbable story around the heat exchanger for the purposes of trial.

This case being what it is, anything's possible. But these attorneys kept Rossi as a client when they shifted firms and have had no trouble sticking with him. I doubt that a last-second ethical decision was the spark for the settlement.

Rossi WINS BIG !!! - LENR WIN !

More thoughts later. But briefly:

Winners: IH, Rossi, & 3rd Party Defendents

Losers: Dewey, Maryyugo, Krivit, and Fred Z. ....

Consolation prize: Jed

ultrasure

You sure sound ultrasure.

Evidence please?

The way most people see it is damage limitation. No evidence of any big winners.

Both Rossi and IH have taken serious reputational damage in all this mess.

Quote from MikeDunford

I doubt that a last-second ethical decision was the spark for the settlement.

MikeDunford,

Indeed, that did not happen. If they would have cornered Rossi they would have slaughtered him.

Rossi played them and after the spoliation got denied the case became too uncertain for IH. They cannot be held hostage by Rossi any longer and want to continue their business. They most likely have lost a shitload of money, but more importantly further tarnished their reputation.

Again, i i were a LENR party that has contractual dealings with Thomas Darden i would start looking for "outs" vigorously. If i were a LENR start-up i would want to deal with anybody but Thomas Darden and friends. And lastly, if i were working for a related government body i would keep a close eye on these eels in a bucket of saliva.

Cheers,

JB

Spurious conclusions - c.f. ultrasure.

Quote from MikeDunford

I doubt that a last-second ethical decision was the spark for the settlement.

The spark was likely judge Altonaga's deference in addressing the Plaintiff as Dr. Rossi. This scared the s*** out of IH who decided they would never win a countersuit. My guess is they offered to pay Rossi's lawyer fees and that was it.

In the movie that will be released based on this story, such fees will be 50%/50% shared with Rossi by prior agreement.

Rossi's lawsuit was another masterpiece.

Three and a half more millions and the guarantee that IH will never even think of getting their condos back.

But it's all fiction.

Quote from THHuxleynew

 

Financially, IH must be better this way than if the trial had proceeded. The legal fees would then be much higher and not clear that Rossi could pay them, nor was it clear IH would win everything so completely as to recoup their money.

 

As woodworker alluded to in an earlier post, many contracts have clauses which make attorneys' fees available to the prevailing party in a contractual dispute. The Rossi license did not. A fee award would have been potentially possible depending on the outcome, but by no means certain - it would require a statute authorizing a fees award, and the judge has a great deal of discretion to award a different amount than the one requested. Such modifications are generally in a downward direction. (In other words, I don't think IH ever had a snowball's chance in hell of recovering all their legal fees.)

As far as additional costs, even if a very low billing rate is assumed, and even if the attorneys put in no more than 10 hours of billable work each per day of trial, IH could still have easily been looking at 6-figure attorneys fees for the entire trial.

notice they settled after IH's opening arguments, not after Rossi's. That says a lot.

Quote from Shane D.

Rossi's expert Dr. Wong visited Doral. He concluded that without a mezzazine HE, the first person to die would be in the control room (air conditioned container next to 1MW plant). Wong did not see the HE...because Rossi supposedly dismantled it, and instead went only by what Rossisaid. He did however, study what was there and found the building as it was during his visit, lacked sufficient ventilation to exhaust 1MW.

Do you know if Wong has seen the large roof exhaust fan directly above the JM work area? I think Murray and Smith ignored it ....( anyway I imagine that it no longer make sense to talk about it ....)