Judge reduces Gibson's Bakery award to $25 million against Oberlin College

[TexasTowelie]

ELYRIA — A Lorain County judge has reduced the total amount of damages won by the Gibson family and Gibson’s Bakery in Oberlin in their recent lawsuit to just more than $25 million against Oberlin College.

In a three-page judgment entry handed down Thursday, Common Pleas Judge John Miraldi reduced by almost half the jury’s $44 million award, which had consisted of more than $11 million in compensatory damages and $33 million in punitive damages.

Those damages were awarded to the plaintiffs following a six-week trial in which jurors found Oberlin College and its vice president and dean of students, Meredith Raimondo, damaged the century-old business relationship the college and bakery shared, as well as libeled the Gibson family.

The reduction in damages was not unexpected, several legal experts who have been following the case told The Chronicle-Telegram.

Read more: http://www.chroniclet.com/cops-and-courts/2019/06/28/Judge-reduces-Gibson-39-s-Bakery-award-to-25-million.html
(Elyria Chronicle-Telegram)

[Jake Stern]

1. Between this award and the wrongful death judgement

Lorain County juries are on a roll.

[TexasTowelie]

2. I wonder if they are granting huge punitive damage awards just to get the headlines.

Unfortunately, those large jury awards may have an adverse effect as insurance premiums skyrocket and businesses decide not to open there. It will also spur on legislators to adopt tort reforms to limit punitive damages that are deemed as being excessive.

[Jake Stern]

3. Really torn on this issue

On one hand big time judgments are overkill like hitting a woman in prison for the next 2 decades with a $70 million wrongful death judgment that even the plaintiff's lawyers concede they will likely never see a cent from.

On the other sometimes a message needs to be sent, especially to institutions like Oberlin College that your administration can't use your clout to try and punish a small business your students are having beef with and who refuse to give in to absurd demands like turning first time shoplifters over to Oberlin College instead of the police.

Also the woman who killed that toddler owned up and took responsibility for her actions and accepted the consequences that came with it.

Oberlin College is acting like that guy in a fight who got knocked to the ground but is still talking shit. The president just released a letter that basically keeps the whole "Gibson's has a history of racism and if Allyn Gibson hadn't chased the one student the others wouldn't have jumped in" narrative going.