Last night, I wrote from a position of being ...annoyed.... Today I'm
writing from a voice of experience to supplement the part of what Tibor
said quoted below. (The experience that I speak of is my experiences at
my last law firm where I represented the Catholic Church corporations in
abuse cases.)
There were six plaintiffs in the abuse case. There was a settlement
payment of $1.3MM to the plaintiffs. (This is all available in the
public record. You can count the plaintiffs here:
https://www.paed.uscourts.gov/documents/opinions/07D0868P.pdf and the
$1.3MM is all over the internet).
I'm going to be generous and say that the attorney took a 1/4 cut of
that. (He would be working on contingency, and the normal amount is 1/3.
1/4 is generous.) That means he takes $325,000. That leaves $975,000.
Divide that by six, which leaves $162,500 per plaintiff.
Is this a lot? Let's see.
First, funds like this is normally held in trust for the victims. So the
kids each get that money. Therapy for abuse can run anywhere from a year
or two to approximately ten non-consecutive years. From information
garnered from friends, therapy sessions run about $100 per session after
insurance covers it. One session a month for 10 years is 120 sessions,
at $100/session is $12,000. But, sessions won't always be once per
month. Often for a time they will be once a week or once every two
weeks. That adds up quickly. That doesn't include medication and other
such things.
Okay, so let's say, extremely conservatively, you have one person,
seeing a therapist once a month for 10 years, without medication or
anything else. That leaves that Plaintiff with ~$150,000.
Now, look at Tibor's statements below. What price do you put on that?
Most abuse victims have other psychological and sociological issues.
Alcoholism and drug abuse are common. Relationship issues are common.
Sometimes suicide attempts are made. What's the price you put on the
mental harm?
I don't know, but although $150,000 sounds like a lot, in the end, it
really isn't.
And my numbers here are EXTREMELY conservative. (More likely, the
attorney would take 1/3, the therapy would be more intensive and
therefore cost more, and there would be medication costs as well. )
Patrick
because seriously, this moves outside the realm of what Baron Gabriel,
OP knows.
On Wed, Nov 5, 2014, at 08:01 AM, Mark Schuldenfrei wrote:
> WARNING: passionate feelings ahead.
>
...
> These parents are not "rich". It is quite possible that the
> children are significantly and permanently harmed by the
> acts of Ben Shragger. Harmed, in the sense of perhaps
> suicidal, unable to love or trust, degraded in self esteem,
> confused as to sexuality. Perhaps less likely to be able
> to earn a living, especially if the trauma interfered with
> their schooling or has made it hard for the children to
> function in society.
>
> The money is small compensation for them, and their past, current
> and future needs. Whether those needs are income, or
> therapy, or other assistance.
>
> The money may also be compensation for harms to the parents -
> who, while caring for a highly compromised child, may have
> had adverse impact on their work or home life. The stress
> of raising a child who is highly traumatized can, in turn,
> cause marital stresses, or psychological stresses on the
> parent, or harm their income potential.
>
...
--
Patrick Anderson
[log in to unmask]
"No matter how much you feed the wolf,
he keeps looking at the forest." --Ilse Lehiste
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