In a court filing, the NFL has alleged that former players and their attorneys have filed hundreds of false claims under the concussion settlement.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/nfl-alleges-deep-and-widespread-fraud-in-concussion-settlement-1523641002
Both sides have been concerned for some time that unscrupulous lawyers would seek to take advantage of former players, particularly those who are legitimately injured and might lack the cognitive capacity to understand the process.
https://nyti.ms/2vqEtVh
This dispute puts the concussion issue back on the front pages, which isn’t a good look for the NFL, but with hundreds of millions of dollars potentially at stake, they have little choice but to fight back. And anyone who has ever looked at the spate of asbestos litigation understands that claims of injured people, corporate misconduct, and slimy lawyers seeking to capitalize on the situation are far from mutually exclusive.
We’ve had some discussions about this subject in other concussion-related threads, but now that it’s clear the settlement is going to be a news story for some time to come, I thought it deserved its own thread.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/nfl-alleges-deep-and-widespread-fraud-in-concussion-settlement-1523641002
For their part, claimants have accused the NFL of dragging its feet in approving payments, though it isn’t clear that the NFL has much control over that process, which is handled pursuant to an independent process that was spelled out in the settlement.The motion—filed in the U.S. District Court for Eastern Pennsyl-vania, where the settlement is overseen—says that an independent administrator in the case has recommended that more than 400 claims be rejected because of fraud. That amounts to 23% of the total claims submitted and has a potential value of hundreds of millions of dollars based on the claims already awarded.
Among the allegations: At least one player was advised to show up to a neuropsychological evaluation hungover and on Valium, to ensure that he failed cognitive tests required to qualify for a settle-ment. Medical reports submitted by one neurologist included identical vital signs for more than 20 different players. One doctor claimed to have to have spent 130 hours evaluating players in a single day—on two separate occasions.
Both sides have been concerned for some time that unscrupulous lawyers would seek to take advantage of former players, particularly those who are legitimately injured and might lack the cognitive capacity to understand the process.
https://nyti.ms/2vqEtVh
This dispute puts the concussion issue back on the front pages, which isn’t a good look for the NFL, but with hundreds of millions of dollars potentially at stake, they have little choice but to fight back. And anyone who has ever looked at the spate of asbestos litigation understands that claims of injured people, corporate misconduct, and slimy lawyers seeking to capitalize on the situation are far from mutually exclusive.
We’ve had some discussions about this subject in other concussion-related threads, but now that it’s clear the settlement is going to be a news story for some time to come, I thought it deserved its own thread.