Anonymous wrote:Reading through Liman's Opinion dismissing Wayfarer etc's claims, here were a few excerpts from the Extortion claim section that I enjoyed:
Demanding harassment free working conditions /= extortion: "Even if they turn out to be unneeded, an employee can insist on protections at workplace for sexual harassment without being accused of extortion. If an employer accedes, it cannot later claim to be a victim of the employee’s wrongful threats."
Hoist by his own petard: "Although the Wayfarer Parties allege that they did not believe Lively deserved a producer credit or p.g.a. mark, Dkt. No. 50 ¶¶ 153–155, they also allege that Lively took over significant production responsibilities, see id. ¶ 296 (stating that Lively used baseless sexual harassment allegations “to assert unilateral control over every aspect of the production”); id. ¶ 344 (alleging that Lively seized creative control over the production and the Wayfarer Parties “were deprived of the opportunity to produce, edit, and market a film”); cf. United States v. Jackson, 180 F.3d 55, 70–72 (2d Cir.), on reh’g, 196 F.3d 383 (2d Cir. 1999) (suggesting that a threat is not wrongful if it has a “nexus to a plausible claim of right”)."
Hard bargaining /= extortion: "The fact that a plaintiff decides it is more financially beneficial to acquiesce to a demand than to sue does not mean the plaintiff lacks an adequate remedy in damages. Having made their decision, the Wayfarer Parties cannot now seek to recover in damages for what they would have obtained had they not agreed and had Lively promoted some different version of the film more consistent with the Wayfarer Parties’ artistic vision."
I also thought it was interesting in the TMZ clip that Freedman said he was given leave by the judge to file an amended complaint for the 4 following claims, because Judge Liman specifically forbids Freedman from amending for two of these lol:
1. Intentional interference of a contractual agreement (a/g Lively and Reynolds);
2. Intentional interference with prospective economic advantage (a/g Lively and Reynolds);
3. Negligent interference with prospective economic advantage (a/g Lively and Reynolds? not sure);
4. Breach of implied duty of covenant and good faith and fair dealing (only a/g Lively).
When you look at the opinion itself, Liman explicitly says in two places that he grants Wayfarer etc leave to amend only for the following two claims: tortious interference with contract and breach of implied contract.
And footnote 66 p.130 specifically lays out that the court will not permit amendment for the following claims (some of which appear on Freedman's list):
* False light
* Breach of implied covenant;
* Intentional or negligent interference with prospective economic relations;
* Promissory fraud.
If you specifically go back to Wayfarer's Amended Complaint and look at the counts, you can track that Judge Liman means to allow Wayfarer to amend ONLY for the following:
1. Liman says "Tortious interference with contract" which tracks to Count 5 in the amended complaint: Intentional Interference with Contractual Relations (involving the WME interference);
2. Liman says "Breach of implied contract" which tracks to Count 4 in the amended complaint: Breach of Implied Covenant of Good Faith and Fair Dealing (involving the contract, if it exists, between Lively and Wayfarer).
Freedman says that he is going to include negligent and intentional interference with prospective economic advantage in the amended complaint, which tracks to counts 7 and 6 of the amended complaint involving the WME contract. However, Liman explicitly forbids Freedman for amending these interference with prospective economic advantage claims due to futility! He explains that the failure of the defamation claim against Reynolds is fatal to these economic advantage claims, since interference needs to be through a wrongful act and Liman found Reynolds statement could not be considered as such.
So, a day later and Freedman is already spouting wild nonsense and either does not understand Judge Liman's opinion better than me, who looked at this for 20 minutes, or alternatively Freedman has decided to explicitly ignore it. A++ as usual Mssr. Freedman.
This is excellent, thank you for putting it together.
Freedman looks very out of the loop on this -- no reply until Tuesday and then his response seems to have factual errors that will come back to bite him. Either he'll finally read the decision closely enough to understand they cannot replead everything he says he's going to, OR he'll replead it all and get bench slapped for violating the judge's order.
Dp and I don’t post much on here but isn’t freedman Baldonis lawyer? How is he ‘out of the loop’ for not responding to a court decision from Monday on… Tuesday… ? Or do you mean something else? Because that seems pretty timely to me!!
DP but in this high profile cases it's typical for the lawyers to comment immediately in the articles that come out in the hours after the decision drops, even if it's just to say they plan to appeal. So yes I think it's unusual that Freedman waited a day, and then in addition, isn't reading the decision correctly according to PP, even with that extra time.
Dp. I’m a litigator and have worked with crisis PR for some high profile litigations, and I don’t agree. We would never want to completely rush a statement without taking a beat to pause and gather our thoughts. As long as a statement came out around the same news cycle, it would be fine and perfectly industry typical (not that there’s a hard and fast rule as this Pp seems to want to think - lol).
As far as not reading the decision ‘correctly’, that only matters when they file! It seems that the point they wants to make is that they plan to continue, and that’s really the only message that matters. Totally standard stuff ime.
I can see taking more than 4 hours to respond because it’s a longer decision.
But if, as you say, you need to “gather your thoughts,” that extra time should really ensure that your lead attorney does not then turn around and get the claims you are refiling wrong. You would not see Manatt or Willkie making this stupid mistake tbh. You don’t overstate what you’re going to come back fighting on, either to your client (who Freedman should have consulted with before going public on TMZ lol) or to the public.
This just emphasizes to me how Freedman is absolutely obsessed with PR to the point where him being on TV is more important than what he is actually saying. Wtf is wrong with this dude? He took a whole day and didn’t figure out his remaining claims properly, which I did in 20 minutes? Remember Succession? This is sh!t show at the clown factory stuff.
I don’t think anyone really cares about the details, just the overall message.
Do you know these lawyers personally? Are you a lawyer? I’ve heard of freedman because he represents famous clients, but I would never normally see the names of lawyers in PR statements and I think 99.99 percent of people don’t know or care either way. My colleagues and I laugh bc when one of our cases makes it in the news, it’s so very rare to see lawyer names mentioned. People don’t notice or care. But you seem to.
It seems very personal to you.
I am a lawyer (I wouldn’t expect a non-lawyer to figure the claim tracing I did above out, except maybe a very good paralegal) and while my firm never goes on TMZ, we do get quoted in news articles, especially legal pubs. If we made a mistake like this about the remaining claims we had in a lawsuit in one of those, it would mean an immediate client call to do damage control. Whoever’s mistake it was would get reprimanded. People woukd “care about the details” lolol.
But Freedman is in charge of this sh!t show so maybe when he makes mistakes — like this or like not ever filing an amended complaint so that nearly all of Baldoni’s claims get dismissed *poof* — maybe the client doesn’t know how to reprimand him. Since he handled the PR so brilliantly! But on the legal part of being a lawyer, he is sucking pretty hard, turns out.
Well, I’m not entirely sure it was a mistake but in any event, the crisis PR I worked with would never suggest going out with some other statement like you’re suggesting. ‘Oh we said we’d re file 4 claims, but we actually meant 3’. It’s really silly to think anyone would care. It’s not like PR statements are written guarantees!
He should definitely say that. That would be wrong, also, so very on brand for him. He only has 2 remaining claims.
He’s not wrong. There are four claims that fall under the rubric of the two causes of actions the judge said he could replead. It’s just a difference in semantics.
lol no! Nice try! He went on tv to say he has 4 claims remaking and will include in his amended complaint, and specifically named two of those four claims as (1) intentional interference with prospective economic advantage and (2) negligent interference with prospective economic advantage. Which is a problem because the judge specifically told him in the order that those claims are dismissed with prejudice and he cannot refile.
Keep up.
You are incorrect (and extremely rude, as usual). Anyway, this lawyer went through the comparing and there are indeed four., but so closely related in nature, that it is two causes of action. You can watch, if you liike, but the don’t want to waste my time typing it all out for you. https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8MwAhm2/
I can’t access this from my phone, but whatever this TikTok person is saying appears to directly contradict what *Baldoni’s lead attorney Bryan Freedman* said yesterday when he specifically named the four distinct claims he would raise, two of which were dismissed with prejudice by the judge.
He’s didn’t say four distinct claims, he said four claims. She went through the complaint and agrees. Sorry you wasted your morning with three pages of rambling posts on a non issue, but that’s what you do, all day, every day.
DP. Lmao 🤣
I signed off and just read through a few pages and this rabid poster was going on and on about freedman (why?? Is she a scorned lover?) and ‘late’ PR statements that were ‘WRONG’!
I mean, really, who cares? The case is still ongoing, and will likely go on for quite awhile with more twists and turns.
But this obsession with a lawyer in a case??? I’ve never seen anything like it!
Is this woman mentally ill or does she think this is some sort of wise PR strategy for Blake? Post on and on about garbled details, obsessively focusing on lawyers and other things 99.99 of the public doesn’t care about?? lol
Honestly, I worry about her health, she is here 24/7, posting with a high amount of venom, and is constantly referencing reddit forums on this topic as well. Her family should intervene.
Seriously agree. She seems disconnected from reality much of the time, and is filled with such nonsensical venom… over minor things like a PR statement referencing 4 claims instead of the 2 she thinks that the lawyer should have mentioned. ?? Or a PR statement coming out the next AM instead of the night before? It’s curious she believes she knows the ‘right’ way these things should be handled. Delusions of grandeur.
My theory is it's Kat Ortega, who spams Reddit all day about Bryan Freedman. Genuinely think Kat is in love with that man.
Who is Kat Ortega?
Whoever it is posts like a borderline personality scorned lover!!!
Look, I’m thick skinned enough that this doesn’t much bother me at this point — I guess I don’t respect you enough for your dumb comment to hurt lol.
But at the same time, look at how easy it is to attempt to discredit my substantive comment about a mistake Freedman made yesterday in his legal analysis of the claims remaining in his complaint! Look how reflexively JB supporters resort to the “scorned lover” and poor borderline personality disorder accusations — both of which they have also been leveling at Lively! This is a guy you support who says he is a male feminist, and yet these tactics are as gross and dirty as this see from an MRA supporter.
I made detailed legal substantive criticism (not, like, accusations that you were tracking my IP address), and you came back with “scorned lover” and borderline personality disorder. 👌
The “mistake” that wasn’t a mistake that you droned on about for hours? That’s your defense of substance? Good lord.
Pretty sure this mistake is a mistake like I said and these other folks are getting it wrong. I think they are saying that intentional and negligent interference with prospective economic relationship are still repleadable, as parts of the "tortious interference with contractual relations or prospective economic advantage" part of the opinion. They are missing the footnote I pointed out, and also the part of that opinion where the judge gives an independent reason why these intentional/negligent interference with prospective economic relationship claims must be out: "Regarding the claims of interference with prospective economic advantage, because the Wayfarer Parties do not allege that Reynolds’ statements were defamatory, they do not allege that they were independently wrongful. See Korea Supply, 63 P.3d at 954 (“[A]n act is independently wrongful if it is unlawful, that is, if it is proscribed by some constitutional, statutory, regulatory, common law, or other determinable legal standard.”)
So even though he will let Freedman try again on the tortious interference with contractual relations, if he can actually produce a contract, Liman is saying you need a wrongful act to support an interference with prospective economic advantage claim (whether interference is intentional or negligent), and he's already said Reynolds' statement wasn't wrongful in determining that it wasn't defamatory.
And I bet that somewhere today there was some lower level associate at Willkie or Manatt who looked up the cited Korea Supply case just like I did to be absolutely sure that Freedman really couldn’t refile on the two prospective economic advantage claims (he can’t, no wrongful act), and that there are now either emails or Teams chats discussing what to do about Freedman’s dumb plan. Raise in advance with the judge? I bet not. Let Freedman waste the time and resources on putting them in the complaint, and then cite the opinion and the Korea Supply case showing the claims must fail? That’s probably the way. Unless Freedman realizes his mistake (or very probably can’t cite to a WME contract ha) and drops them.
Anonymous wrote:Reading through Liman's Opinion dismissing Wayfarer etc's claims, here were a few excerpts from the Extortion claim section that I enjoyed:
Demanding harassment free working conditions /= extortion: "Even if they turn out to be unneeded, an employee can insist on protections at workplace for sexual harassment without being accused of extortion. If an employer accedes, it cannot later claim to be a victim of the employee’s wrongful threats."
Hoist by his own petard: "Although the Wayfarer Parties allege that they did not believe Lively deserved a producer credit or p.g.a. mark, Dkt. No. 50 ¶¶ 153–155, they also allege that Lively took over significant production responsibilities, see id. ¶ 296 (stating that Lively used baseless sexual harassment allegations “to assert unilateral control over every aspect of the production”); id. ¶ 344 (alleging that Lively seized creative control over the production and the Wayfarer Parties “were deprived of the opportunity to produce, edit, and market a film”); cf. United States v. Jackson, 180 F.3d 55, 70–72 (2d Cir.), on reh’g, 196 F.3d 383 (2d Cir. 1999) (suggesting that a threat is not wrongful if it has a “nexus to a plausible claim of right”)."
Hard bargaining /= extortion: "The fact that a plaintiff decides it is more financially beneficial to acquiesce to a demand than to sue does not mean the plaintiff lacks an adequate remedy in damages. Having made their decision, the Wayfarer Parties cannot now seek to recover in damages for what they would have obtained had they not agreed and had Lively promoted some different version of the film more consistent with the Wayfarer Parties’ artistic vision."
I also thought it was interesting in the TMZ clip that Freedman said he was given leave by the judge to file an amended complaint for the 4 following claims, because Judge Liman specifically forbids Freedman from amending for two of these lol:
1. Intentional interference of a contractual agreement (a/g Lively and Reynolds);
2. Intentional interference with prospective economic advantage (a/g Lively and Reynolds);
3. Negligent interference with prospective economic advantage (a/g Lively and Reynolds? not sure);
4. Breach of implied duty of covenant and good faith and fair dealing (only a/g Lively).
When you look at the opinion itself, Liman explicitly says in two places that he grants Wayfarer etc leave to amend only for the following two claims: tortious interference with contract and breach of implied contract.
And footnote 66 p.130 specifically lays out that the court will not permit amendment for the following claims (some of which appear on Freedman's list):
* False light
* Breach of implied covenant;
* Intentional or negligent interference with prospective economic relations;
* Promissory fraud.
If you specifically go back to Wayfarer's Amended Complaint and look at the counts, you can track that Judge Liman means to allow Wayfarer to amend ONLY for the following:
1. Liman says "Tortious interference with contract" which tracks to Count 5 in the amended complaint: Intentional Interference with Contractual Relations (involving the WME interference);
2. Liman says "Breach of implied contract" which tracks to Count 4 in the amended complaint: Breach of Implied Covenant of Good Faith and Fair Dealing (involving the contract, if it exists, between Lively and Wayfarer).
Freedman says that he is going to include negligent and intentional interference with prospective economic advantage in the amended complaint, which tracks to counts 7 and 6 of the amended complaint involving the WME contract. However, Liman explicitly forbids Freedman for amending these interference with prospective economic advantage claims due to futility! He explains that the failure of the defamation claim against Reynolds is fatal to these economic advantage claims, since interference needs to be through a wrongful act and Liman found Reynolds statement could not be considered as such.
So, a day later and Freedman is already spouting wild nonsense and either does not understand Judge Liman's opinion better than me, who looked at this for 20 minutes, or alternatively Freedman has decided to explicitly ignore it. A++ as usual Mssr. Freedman.
This is excellent, thank you for putting it together.
Freedman looks very out of the loop on this -- no reply until Tuesday and then his response seems to have factual errors that will come back to bite him. Either he'll finally read the decision closely enough to understand they cannot replead everything he says he's going to, OR he'll replead it all and get bench slapped for violating the judge's order.
Dp and I don’t post much on here but isn’t freedman Baldonis lawyer? How is he ‘out of the loop’ for not responding to a court decision from Monday on… Tuesday… ? Or do you mean something else? Because that seems pretty timely to me!!
DP but in this high profile cases it's typical for the lawyers to comment immediately in the articles that come out in the hours after the decision drops, even if it's just to say they plan to appeal. So yes I think it's unusual that Freedman waited a day, and then in addition, isn't reading the decision correctly according to PP, even with that extra time.
Dp. I’m a litigator and have worked with crisis PR for some high profile litigations, and I don’t agree. We would never want to completely rush a statement without taking a beat to pause and gather our thoughts. As long as a statement came out around the same news cycle, it would be fine and perfectly industry typical (not that there’s a hard and fast rule as this Pp seems to want to think - lol).
As far as not reading the decision ‘correctly’, that only matters when they file! It seems that the point they wants to make is that they plan to continue, and that’s really the only message that matters. Totally standard stuff ime.
I can see taking more than 4 hours to respond because it’s a longer decision.
But if, as you say, you need to “gather your thoughts,” that extra time should really ensure that your lead attorney does not then turn around and get the claims you are refiling wrong. You would not see Manatt or Willkie making this stupid mistake tbh. You don’t overstate what you’re going to come back fighting on, either to your client (who Freedman should have consulted with before going public on TMZ lol) or to the public.
This just emphasizes to me how Freedman is absolutely obsessed with PR to the point where him being on TV is more important than what he is actually saying. Wtf is wrong with this dude? He took a whole day and didn’t figure out his remaining claims properly, which I did in 20 minutes? Remember Succession? This is sh!t show at the clown factory stuff.
I don’t think anyone really cares about the details, just the overall message.
Do you know these lawyers personally? Are you a lawyer? I’ve heard of freedman because he represents famous clients, but I would never normally see the names of lawyers in PR statements and I think 99.99 percent of people don’t know or care either way. My colleagues and I laugh bc when one of our cases makes it in the news, it’s so very rare to see lawyer names mentioned. People don’t notice or care. But you seem to.
It seems very personal to you.
I am a lawyer (I wouldn’t expect a non-lawyer to figure the claim tracing I did above out, except maybe a very good paralegal) and while my firm never goes on TMZ, we do get quoted in news articles, especially legal pubs. If we made a mistake like this about the remaining claims we had in a lawsuit in one of those, it would mean an immediate client call to do damage control. Whoever’s mistake it was would get reprimanded. People woukd “care about the details” lolol.
But Freedman is in charge of this sh!t show so maybe when he makes mistakes — like this or like not ever filing an amended complaint so that nearly all of Baldoni’s claims get dismissed *poof* — maybe the client doesn’t know how to reprimand him. Since he handled the PR so brilliantly! But on the legal part of being a lawyer, he is sucking pretty hard, turns out.
Well, I’m not entirely sure it was a mistake but in any event, the crisis PR I worked with would never suggest going out with some other statement like you’re suggesting. ‘Oh we said we’d re file 4 claims, but we actually meant 3’. It’s really silly to think anyone would care. It’s not like PR statements are written guarantees!
He should definitely say that. That would be wrong, also, so very on brand for him. He only has 2 remaining claims.
He’s not wrong. There are four claims that fall under the rubric of the two causes of actions the judge said he could replead. It’s just a difference in semantics.
lol no! Nice try! He went on tv to say he has 4 claims remaking and will include in his amended complaint, and specifically named two of those four claims as (1) intentional interference with prospective economic advantage and (2) negligent interference with prospective economic advantage. Which is a problem because the judge specifically told him in the order that those claims are dismissed with prejudice and he cannot refile.
Keep up.
You are incorrect (and extremely rude, as usual). Anyway, this lawyer went through the comparing and there are indeed four., but so closely related in nature, that it is two causes of action. You can watch, if you liike, but the don’t want to waste my time typing it all out for you. https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8MwAhm2/
I can’t access this from my phone, but whatever this TikTok person is saying appears to directly contradict what *Baldoni’s lead attorney Bryan Freedman* said yesterday when he specifically named the four distinct claims he would raise, two of which were dismissed with prejudice by the judge.
He’s didn’t say four distinct claims, he said four claims. She went through the complaint and agrees. Sorry you wasted your morning with three pages of rambling posts on a non issue, but that’s what you do, all day, every day.
DP. Lmao 🤣
I signed off and just read through a few pages and this rabid poster was going on and on about freedman (why?? Is she a scorned lover?) and ‘late’ PR statements that were ‘WRONG’!
I mean, really, who cares? The case is still ongoing, and will likely go on for quite awhile with more twists and turns.
But this obsession with a lawyer in a case??? I’ve never seen anything like it!
Is this woman mentally ill or does she think this is some sort of wise PR strategy for Blake? Post on and on about garbled details, obsessively focusing on lawyers and other things 99.99 of the public doesn’t care about?? lol
Honestly, I worry about her health, she is here 24/7, posting with a high amount of venom, and is constantly referencing reddit forums on this topic as well. Her family should intervene.
Seriously agree. She seems disconnected from reality much of the time, and is filled with such nonsensical venom… over minor things like a PR statement referencing 4 claims instead of the 2 she thinks that the lawyer should have mentioned. ?? Or a PR statement coming out the next AM instead of the night before? It’s curious she believes she knows the ‘right’ way these things should be handled. Delusions of grandeur.
My theory is it's Kat Ortega, who spams Reddit all day about Bryan Freedman. Genuinely think Kat is in love with that man.
Who is Kat Ortega?
Whoever it is posts like a borderline personality scorned lover!!!
Look, I’m thick skinned enough that this doesn’t much bother me at this point — I guess I don’t respect you enough for your dumb comment to hurt lol.
But at the same time, look at how easy it is to attempt to discredit my substantive comment about a mistake Freedman made yesterday in his legal analysis of the claims remaining in his complaint! Look how reflexively JB supporters resort to the “scorned lover” and poor borderline personality disorder accusations — both of which they have also been leveling at Lively! This is a guy you support who says he is a male feminist, and yet these tactics are as gross and dirty as this see from an MRA supporter.
I made detailed legal substantive criticism (not, like, accusations that you were tracking my IP address), and you came back with “scorned lover” and borderline personality disorder. 👌
The “mistake” that wasn’t a mistake that you droned on about for hours? That’s your defense of substance? Good lord.
Pretty sure this mistake is a mistake like I said and these other folks are getting it wrong. I think they are saying that intentional and negligent interference with prospective economic relationship are still repleadable, as parts of the "tortious interference with contractual relations or prospective economic advantage" part of the opinion. They are missing the footnote I pointed out, and also the part of that opinion where the judge gives an independent reason why these intentional/negligent interference with prospective economic relationship claims must be out: "Regarding the claims of interference with prospective economic advantage, because the Wayfarer Parties do not allege that Reynolds’ statements were defamatory, they do not allege that they were independently wrongful. See Korea Supply, 63 P.3d at 954 (“[A]n act is independently wrongful if it is unlawful, that is, if it is proscribed by some constitutional, statutory, regulatory, common law, or other determinable legal standard.”)
So even though he will let Freedman try again on the tortious interference with contractual relations, if he can actually produce a contract, Liman is saying you need a wrongful act to support an interference with prospective economic advantage claim (whether interference is intentional or negligent), and he's already said Reynolds' statement wasn't wrongful in determining that it wasn't defamatory.
And I bet that somewhere today there was some lower level associate at Willkie or Manatt who looked up the cited Korea Supply case just like I did to be absolutely sure that Freedman really couldn’t refile on the two prospective economic advantage claims (he can’t, no wrongful act), and that there are now either emails or Teams chats discussing what to do about Freedman’s dumb plan. Raise in advance with the judge? I bet not. Let Freedman waste the time and resources on putting them in the complaint, and then cite the opinion and the Korea Supply case showing the claims must fail? That’s probably the way. Unless Freedman realizes his mistake (or very probably can’t cite to a WME contract ha) and drops them.
I'm assuming someone on Freedman's team will figure it out tbh.
Anonymous wrote:For the record, there was some sock puppeting I reported, and the posts were removed. To the perpetrator, we notice.
Interesting. For future reference, which poster was it?
Can’t say definitively of course but a Lively supporter whose post was similar in tone and style to a frequent Lively poster.
I didn’t post this first comment or make this request, but I thought I noticed a bunch of posts disappearing about Baldoni supporters saying they were “new” and saying they didn’t know much about the case but Lively seemed bad bad? No?
Anonymous wrote:For the record, there was some sock puppeting I reported, and the posts were removed. To the perpetrator, we notice.
Interesting. For future reference, which poster was it?
Can’t say definitively of course but a Lively supporter whose post was similar in tone and style to a frequent Lively poster.
I didn’t post this first comment or make this request, but I thought I noticed a bunch of posts disappearing about Baldoni supporters saying they were “new” and saying they didn’t know much about the case but Lively seemed bad bad? No?
The ones I reported were a Lively supporter sock piuppeting just a page or two ago.
Anonymous wrote:For the record, there was some sock puppeting I reported, and the posts were removed. To the perpetrator, we notice.
Interesting. For future reference, which poster was it?
Can’t say definitively of course but a Lively supporter whose post was similar in tone and style to a frequent Lively poster.
I didn’t post this first comment or make this request, but I thought I noticed a bunch of posts disappearing about Baldoni supporters saying they were “new” and saying they didn’t know much about the case but Lively seemed bad bad? No?
The ones I reported were a Lively supporter sock piuppeting just a page or two ago.
Nothing of mine is gone and when I look the pages over I don’t remember anything that’s now missing — I don’t not NOT believe you but I have no idea what you’re talking about. 🤷♀️
Anonymous wrote:Reading through Liman's Opinion dismissing Wayfarer etc's claims, here were a few excerpts from the Extortion claim section that I enjoyed:
Demanding harassment free working conditions /= extortion: "Even if they turn out to be unneeded, an employee can insist on protections at workplace for sexual harassment without being accused of extortion. If an employer accedes, it cannot later claim to be a victim of the employee’s wrongful threats."
Hoist by his own petard: "Although the Wayfarer Parties allege that they did not believe Lively deserved a producer credit or p.g.a. mark, Dkt. No. 50 ¶¶ 153–155, they also allege that Lively took over significant production responsibilities, see id. ¶ 296 (stating that Lively used baseless sexual harassment allegations “to assert unilateral control over every aspect of the production”); id. ¶ 344 (alleging that Lively seized creative control over the production and the Wayfarer Parties “were deprived of the opportunity to produce, edit, and market a film”); cf. United States v. Jackson, 180 F.3d 55, 70–72 (2d Cir.), on reh’g, 196 F.3d 383 (2d Cir. 1999) (suggesting that a threat is not wrongful if it has a “nexus to a plausible claim of right”)."
Hard bargaining /= extortion: "The fact that a plaintiff decides it is more financially beneficial to acquiesce to a demand than to sue does not mean the plaintiff lacks an adequate remedy in damages. Having made their decision, the Wayfarer Parties cannot now seek to recover in damages for what they would have obtained had they not agreed and had Lively promoted some different version of the film more consistent with the Wayfarer Parties’ artistic vision."
I also thought it was interesting in the TMZ clip that Freedman said he was given leave by the judge to file an amended complaint for the 4 following claims, because Judge Liman specifically forbids Freedman from amending for two of these lol:
1. Intentional interference of a contractual agreement (a/g Lively and Reynolds);
2. Intentional interference with prospective economic advantage (a/g Lively and Reynolds);
3. Negligent interference with prospective economic advantage (a/g Lively and Reynolds? not sure);
4. Breach of implied duty of covenant and good faith and fair dealing (only a/g Lively).
When you look at the opinion itself, Liman explicitly says in two places that he grants Wayfarer etc leave to amend only for the following two claims: tortious interference with contract and breach of implied contract.
And footnote 66 p.130 specifically lays out that the court will not permit amendment for the following claims (some of which appear on Freedman's list):
* False light
* Breach of implied covenant;
* Intentional or negligent interference with prospective economic relations;
* Promissory fraud.
If you specifically go back to Wayfarer's Amended Complaint and look at the counts, you can track that Judge Liman means to allow Wayfarer to amend ONLY for the following:
1. Liman says "Tortious interference with contract" which tracks to Count 5 in the amended complaint: Intentional Interference with Contractual Relations (involving the WME interference);
2. Liman says "Breach of implied contract" which tracks to Count 4 in the amended complaint: Breach of Implied Covenant of Good Faith and Fair Dealing (involving the contract, if it exists, between Lively and Wayfarer).
Freedman says that he is going to include negligent and intentional interference with prospective economic advantage in the amended complaint, which tracks to counts 7 and 6 of the amended complaint involving the WME contract. However, Liman explicitly forbids Freedman for amending these interference with prospective economic advantage claims due to futility! He explains that the failure of the defamation claim against Reynolds is fatal to these economic advantage claims, since interference needs to be through a wrongful act and Liman found Reynolds statement could not be considered as such.
So, a day later and Freedman is already spouting wild nonsense and either does not understand Judge Liman's opinion better than me, who looked at this for 20 minutes, or alternatively Freedman has decided to explicitly ignore it. A++ as usual Mssr. Freedman.
This is excellent, thank you for putting it together.
Freedman looks very out of the loop on this -- no reply until Tuesday and then his response seems to have factual errors that will come back to bite him. Either he'll finally read the decision closely enough to understand they cannot replead everything he says he's going to, OR he'll replead it all and get bench slapped for violating the judge's order.
Dp and I don’t post much on here but isn’t freedman Baldonis lawyer? How is he ‘out of the loop’ for not responding to a court decision from Monday on… Tuesday… ? Or do you mean something else? Because that seems pretty timely to me!!
DP but in this high profile cases it's typical for the lawyers to comment immediately in the articles that come out in the hours after the decision drops, even if it's just to say they plan to appeal. So yes I think it's unusual that Freedman waited a day, and then in addition, isn't reading the decision correctly according to PP, even with that extra time.
Dp. I’m a litigator and have worked with crisis PR for some high profile litigations, and I don’t agree. We would never want to completely rush a statement without taking a beat to pause and gather our thoughts. As long as a statement came out around the same news cycle, it would be fine and perfectly industry typical (not that there’s a hard and fast rule as this Pp seems to want to think - lol).
As far as not reading the decision ‘correctly’, that only matters when they file! It seems that the point they wants to make is that they plan to continue, and that’s really the only message that matters. Totally standard stuff ime.
I can see taking more than 4 hours to respond because it’s a longer decision.
But if, as you say, you need to “gather your thoughts,” that extra time should really ensure that your lead attorney does not then turn around and get the claims you are refiling wrong. You would not see Manatt or Willkie making this stupid mistake tbh. You don’t overstate what you’re going to come back fighting on, either to your client (who Freedman should have consulted with before going public on TMZ lol) or to the public.
This just emphasizes to me how Freedman is absolutely obsessed with PR to the point where him being on TV is more important than what he is actually saying. Wtf is wrong with this dude? He took a whole day and didn’t figure out his remaining claims properly, which I did in 20 minutes? Remember Succession? This is sh!t show at the clown factory stuff.
I don’t think anyone really cares about the details, just the overall message.
Do you know these lawyers personally? Are you a lawyer? I’ve heard of freedman because he represents famous clients, but I would never normally see the names of lawyers in PR statements and I think 99.99 percent of people don’t know or care either way. My colleagues and I laugh bc when one of our cases makes it in the news, it’s so very rare to see lawyer names mentioned. People don’t notice or care. But you seem to.
It seems very personal to you.
I am a lawyer (I wouldn’t expect a non-lawyer to figure the claim tracing I did above out, except maybe a very good paralegal) and while my firm never goes on TMZ, we do get quoted in news articles, especially legal pubs. If we made a mistake like this about the remaining claims we had in a lawsuit in one of those, it would mean an immediate client call to do damage control. Whoever’s mistake it was would get reprimanded. People woukd “care about the details” lolol.
But Freedman is in charge of this sh!t show so maybe when he makes mistakes — like this or like not ever filing an amended complaint so that nearly all of Baldoni’s claims get dismissed *poof* — maybe the client doesn’t know how to reprimand him. Since he handled the PR so brilliantly! But on the legal part of being a lawyer, he is sucking pretty hard, turns out.
Well, I’m not entirely sure it was a mistake but in any event, the crisis PR I worked with would never suggest going out with some other statement like you’re suggesting. ‘Oh we said we’d re file 4 claims, but we actually meant 3’. It’s really silly to think anyone would care. It’s not like PR statements are written guarantees!
He should definitely say that. That would be wrong, also, so very on brand for him. He only has 2 remaining claims.
He’s not wrong. There are four claims that fall under the rubric of the two causes of actions the judge said he could replead. It’s just a difference in semantics.
lol no! Nice try! He went on tv to say he has 4 claims remaking and will include in his amended complaint, and specifically named two of those four claims as (1) intentional interference with prospective economic advantage and (2) negligent interference with prospective economic advantage. Which is a problem because the judge specifically told him in the order that those claims are dismissed with prejudice and he cannot refile.
Keep up.
You are incorrect (and extremely rude, as usual). Anyway, this lawyer went through the comparing and there are indeed four., but so closely related in nature, that it is two causes of action. You can watch, if you liike, but the don’t want to waste my time typing it all out for you. https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8MwAhm2/
I can’t access this from my phone, but whatever this TikTok person is saying appears to directly contradict what *Baldoni’s lead attorney Bryan Freedman* said yesterday when he specifically named the four distinct claims he would raise, two of which were dismissed with prejudice by the judge.
He’s didn’t say four distinct claims, he said four claims. She went through the complaint and agrees. Sorry you wasted your morning with three pages of rambling posts on a non issue, but that’s what you do, all day, every day.
DP. Lmao 🤣
I signed off and just read through a few pages and this rabid poster was going on and on about freedman (why?? Is she a scorned lover?) and ‘late’ PR statements that were ‘WRONG’!
I mean, really, who cares? The case is still ongoing, and will likely go on for quite awhile with more twists and turns.
But this obsession with a lawyer in a case??? I’ve never seen anything like it!
Is this woman mentally ill or does she think this is some sort of wise PR strategy for Blake? Post on and on about garbled details, obsessively focusing on lawyers and other things 99.99 of the public doesn’t care about?? lol
Honestly, I worry about her health, she is here 24/7, posting with a high amount of venom, and is constantly referencing reddit forums on this topic as well. Her family should intervene.
Seriously agree. She seems disconnected from reality much of the time, and is filled with such nonsensical venom… over minor things like a PR statement referencing 4 claims instead of the 2 she thinks that the lawyer should have mentioned. ?? Or a PR statement coming out the next AM instead of the night before? It’s curious she believes she knows the ‘right’ way these things should be handled. Delusions of grandeur.
My theory is it's Kat Ortega, who spams Reddit all day about Bryan Freedman. Genuinely think Kat is in love with that man.
Who is Kat Ortega?
Whoever it is posts like a borderline personality scorned lover!!!
Look, I’m thick skinned enough that this doesn’t much bother me at this point — I guess I don’t respect you enough for your dumb comment to hurt lol.
But at the same time, look at how easy it is to attempt to discredit my substantive comment about a mistake Freedman made yesterday in his legal analysis of the claims remaining in his complaint! Look how reflexively JB supporters resort to the “scorned lover” and poor borderline personality disorder accusations — both of which they have also been leveling at Lively! This is a guy you support who says he is a male feminist, and yet these tactics are as gross and dirty as this see from an MRA supporter.
I made detailed legal substantive criticism (not, like, accusations that you were tracking my IP address), and you came back with “scorned lover” and borderline personality disorder. 👌
The “mistake” that wasn’t a mistake that you droned on about for hours? That’s your defense of substance? Good lord.
Pretty sure this mistake is a mistake like I said and these other folks are getting it wrong. I think they are saying that intentional and negligent interference with prospective economic relationship are still repleadable, as parts of the "tortious interference with contractual relations or prospective economic advantage" part of the opinion. They are missing the footnote I pointed out, and also the part of that opinion where the judge gives an independent reason why these intentional/negligent interference with prospective economic relationship claims must be out: "Regarding the claims of interference with prospective economic advantage, because the Wayfarer Parties do not allege that Reynolds’ statements were defamatory, they do not allege that they were independently wrongful. See Korea Supply, 63 P.3d at 954 (“[A]n act is independently wrongful if it is unlawful, that is, if it is proscribed by some constitutional, statutory, regulatory, common law, or other determinable legal standard.”)
So even though he will let Freedman try again on the tortious interference with contractual relations, if he can actually produce a contract, Liman is saying you need a wrongful act to support an interference with prospective economic advantage claim (whether interference is intentional or negligent), and he's already said Reynolds' statement wasn't wrongful in determining that it wasn't defamatory.
And I bet that somewhere today there was some lower level associate at Willkie or Manatt who looked up the cited Korea Supply case just like I did to be absolutely sure that Freedman really couldn’t refile on the two prospective economic advantage claims (he can’t, no wrongful act), and that there are now either emails or Teams chats discussing what to do about Freedman’s dumb plan. Raise in advance with the judge? I bet not. Let Freedman waste the time and resources on putting them in the complaint, and then cite the opinion and the Korea Supply case showing the claims must fail? That’s probably the way. Unless Freedman realizes his mistake (or very probably can’t cite to a WME contract ha) and drops them.
I'm assuming someone on Freedman's team will figure it out tbh.
I think lawyers at my firm would sooner commit seppuku than (1) appear on TMZ; or (2) appear on TMZ only to misstate the claims remaining in the case the day after the majority of our claims got booted.
Anonymous wrote:Meanwhile, JB supporters on reddit are combing FamilyTreeNow profiles for Lively's attorneys trying to find a connection to Liman as part of a conspiracy theory that Liman is in the tank for Lively.
Now THAT is how you stalk a lawyer, not by idly noting they seem busy with their caseload because they have a lot of high profile clients.
Lol.
They hate Liman so much that they really need to find some way to GET HIM OUT.
I think Liman is basically just hard-line judge. Remember when he wouldn’t give Lively more than one extra day on her complaint and Baldoni supporters were saying that meant he hated her? No, he is just a stickler. I don’t really think he hates Baldoni or Freedman either, tbh. If Freedman had filed a MTD, I think he might have gotten something, though Gottlieb’s complaint was honestly much more clearly supported by facts directly relating to the underlying claims.
This can also be rough on Lively if/when they go to trial. But I think Willkie and Manatt are up to speed on him now (and Gottlieb has been before him before so likely already knew).
I agree with this analysis, at least in part. I also think that it would have not mattered if Freedman amended, this judge was always going to read the litigation and fair use protections broadly.
A motion to dismiss against Lively would have been unsuccessful. The judge has to accept all her allegations as true, and she pled enough. Summary judgment, however, may be a different story, and I think that may be something Freedman pursues.
Although, can I just say that it would be A M A Z I N G if Freedman did NOT file for summary judgement, and instead issued a statement that he didn’t want to provide Lively with a roadmap for trial, and ended with something about sending Gottlieb to JoAnn Fabrics for cheese?
I think Baldoni supporters still would not revolt, but I don’t know, there are some that are actually starting to get antsy now.
One problem for the JB supporters is that Freedman has intentionally exploited their lack of legal knowledge. Many of them were fully convinced that Blake would be put on trial for stealing the movie, that Taylor Swift would be a central witness in that trial, and that Baldoni would of course prevail because look at all this celeb gossip about Blake being a mean girl who "takes over" the films she's in. If you tried to impose any kind of legal framework on that, they'd freak out and tell you that you didn't know anything, even if you just presented information about how the legal system works in a neutral, FYI way intended to inform and not to argue for Lively's side.
So as Freedman encounters these legal stumbling blocks, JB's supporters are confused because their support for JB was based on a totally false understanding of the case. For those of us who understood from the get-go that JB's claims against Lively and NYT were mostly totally untenable and largely filed for PR reasons, this doesn't really change much. This case was always really about Lively's SH/retaliation claims, it's still about that, the whole "she stole the movie" narrative was largely invented by Freedman to keep people from talking about or focusing on the SH/retaliation claims. And it worked for a while. But now we are back to where we started. But for JB supporters who genuinely believed this whole thing was really about how Lively stole a movie (that she did not steal, that still belongs to Wayfarer, and that JB and others have made a ton of money off of), it feels like the rug has been pulled out from under them. But this is the same rug we've all been standing on since Lively filed her CRD! Literally nothing has changed. But now we will actually get to discuss the SH/retaliation case and can set aside these distractions that never had much of any legal basis to begin with.
You are way overthinking this. People simply read the New York Times article and her complaint on December 21 or whenever, and then 10 days later went on the website and read Justin‘s side. After that, they just wanted fairness. Would there be repercussions for Blake taking over so much of the movie little by little, bit by bit, having her lawyer send threatening emails every two weeks, threatening to walk off the film, Stealing a PGA credit that she didn’t deserve, running up the budget, and then taking over the marketing and doing a real disservice to the themes of the story through marketing she and her husband‘s alcohol lines and her frivolous hair business that was going to flop before it even got off the ground regardless of this mess.
The threads on this website are a little different because there are so many lawyers in the DC metro area that are weighing in, but 99% of the public aren’t arguing back-and-forth legal arguments. People just want justice. And as much as people don’t like Blake if she was sexually harassed, most would want justice for her too.
If people in the public were impressed by Brian Freedman, they were impressed by the way he bought Justin‘s story forward. He did do a good job of making a compelling narrative that was easy to understand and laid out the timeline really well.
Bringing Taylor in by redacting every name but hers was genius and perhaps the biggest win anyone will get from this case. The deteriorating relationship and her not supporting Blake is devastating for Blake and Ryan. Regardless of what happens in this case, that has been a huge blow to their public image.
Anonymous wrote:For the record, there was some sock puppeting I reported, and the posts were removed. To the perpetrator, we notice.
Interesting. For future reference, which poster was it?
Can’t say definitively of course but a Lively supporter whose post was similar in tone and style to a frequent Lively poster.
I didn’t post this first comment or make this request, but I thought I noticed a bunch of posts disappearing about Baldoni supporters saying they were “new” and saying they didn’t know much about the case but Lively seemed bad bad? No?
The ones I reported were a Lively supporter sock piuppeting just a page or two ago.
Nothing of mine is gone and when I look the pages over I don’t remember anything that’s now missing — I don’t not NOT believe you but I have no idea what you’re talking about. 🤷♀️
It seems like you are on here all day, and occasionally jump to report comments that you don’t like. I guess when you’re not on reddit or trying to figure out how to get the Tik Tok app on your phone…
Anonymous wrote:Reading through Liman's Opinion dismissing Wayfarer etc's claims, here were a few excerpts from the Extortion claim section that I enjoyed:
Demanding harassment free working conditions /= extortion: "Even if they turn out to be unneeded, an employee can insist on protections at workplace for sexual harassment without being accused of extortion. If an employer accedes, it cannot later claim to be a victim of the employee’s wrongful threats."
Hoist by his own petard: "Although the Wayfarer Parties allege that they did not believe Lively deserved a producer credit or p.g.a. mark, Dkt. No. 50 ¶¶ 153–155, they also allege that Lively took over significant production responsibilities, see id. ¶ 296 (stating that Lively used baseless sexual harassment allegations “to assert unilateral control over every aspect of the production”); id. ¶ 344 (alleging that Lively seized creative control over the production and the Wayfarer Parties “were deprived of the opportunity to produce, edit, and market a film”); cf. United States v. Jackson, 180 F.3d 55, 70–72 (2d Cir.), on reh’g, 196 F.3d 383 (2d Cir. 1999) (suggesting that a threat is not wrongful if it has a “nexus to a plausible claim of right”)."
Hard bargaining /= extortion: "The fact that a plaintiff decides it is more financially beneficial to acquiesce to a demand than to sue does not mean the plaintiff lacks an adequate remedy in damages. Having made their decision, the Wayfarer Parties cannot now seek to recover in damages for what they would have obtained had they not agreed and had Lively promoted some different version of the film more consistent with the Wayfarer Parties’ artistic vision."
I also thought it was interesting in the TMZ clip that Freedman said he was given leave by the judge to file an amended complaint for the 4 following claims, because Judge Liman specifically forbids Freedman from amending for two of these lol:
1. Intentional interference of a contractual agreement (a/g Lively and Reynolds);
2. Intentional interference with prospective economic advantage (a/g Lively and Reynolds);
3. Negligent interference with prospective economic advantage (a/g Lively and Reynolds? not sure);
4. Breach of implied duty of covenant and good faith and fair dealing (only a/g Lively).
When you look at the opinion itself, Liman explicitly says in two places that he grants Wayfarer etc leave to amend only for the following two claims: tortious interference with contract and breach of implied contract.
And footnote 66 p.130 specifically lays out that the court will not permit amendment for the following claims (some of which appear on Freedman's list):
* False light
* Breach of implied covenant;
* Intentional or negligent interference with prospective economic relations;
* Promissory fraud.
If you specifically go back to Wayfarer's Amended Complaint and look at the counts, you can track that Judge Liman means to allow Wayfarer to amend ONLY for the following:
1. Liman says "Tortious interference with contract" which tracks to Count 5 in the amended complaint: Intentional Interference with Contractual Relations (involving the WME interference);
2. Liman says "Breach of implied contract" which tracks to Count 4 in the amended complaint: Breach of Implied Covenant of Good Faith and Fair Dealing (involving the contract, if it exists, between Lively and Wayfarer).
Freedman says that he is going to include negligent and intentional interference with prospective economic advantage in the amended complaint, which tracks to counts 7 and 6 of the amended complaint involving the WME contract. However, Liman explicitly forbids Freedman for amending these interference with prospective economic advantage claims due to futility! He explains that the failure of the defamation claim against Reynolds is fatal to these economic advantage claims, since interference needs to be through a wrongful act and Liman found Reynolds statement could not be considered as such.
So, a day later and Freedman is already spouting wild nonsense and either does not understand Judge Liman's opinion better than me, who looked at this for 20 minutes, or alternatively Freedman has decided to explicitly ignore it. A++ as usual Mssr. Freedman.
This is excellent, thank you for putting it together.
Freedman looks very out of the loop on this -- no reply until Tuesday and then his response seems to have factual errors that will come back to bite him. Either he'll finally read the decision closely enough to understand they cannot replead everything he says he's going to, OR he'll replead it all and get bench slapped for violating the judge's order.
Dp and I don’t post much on here but isn’t freedman Baldonis lawyer? How is he ‘out of the loop’ for not responding to a court decision from Monday on… Tuesday… ? Or do you mean something else? Because that seems pretty timely to me!!
DP but in this high profile cases it's typical for the lawyers to comment immediately in the articles that come out in the hours after the decision drops, even if it's just to say they plan to appeal. So yes I think it's unusual that Freedman waited a day, and then in addition, isn't reading the decision correctly according to PP, even with that extra time.
Dp. I’m a litigator and have worked with crisis PR for some high profile litigations, and I don’t agree. We would never want to completely rush a statement without taking a beat to pause and gather our thoughts. As long as a statement came out around the same news cycle, it would be fine and perfectly industry typical (not that there’s a hard and fast rule as this Pp seems to want to think - lol).
As far as not reading the decision ‘correctly’, that only matters when they file! It seems that the point they wants to make is that they plan to continue, and that’s really the only message that matters. Totally standard stuff ime.
I can see taking more than 4 hours to respond because it’s a longer decision.
But if, as you say, you need to “gather your thoughts,” that extra time should really ensure that your lead attorney does not then turn around and get the claims you are refiling wrong. You would not see Manatt or Willkie making this stupid mistake tbh. You don’t overstate what you’re going to come back fighting on, either to your client (who Freedman should have consulted with before going public on TMZ lol) or to the public.
This just emphasizes to me how Freedman is absolutely obsessed with PR to the point where him being on TV is more important than what he is actually saying. Wtf is wrong with this dude? He took a whole day and didn’t figure out his remaining claims properly, which I did in 20 minutes? Remember Succession? This is sh!t show at the clown factory stuff.
I don’t think anyone really cares about the details, just the overall message.
Do you know these lawyers personally? Are you a lawyer? I’ve heard of freedman because he represents famous clients, but I would never normally see the names of lawyers in PR statements and I think 99.99 percent of people don’t know or care either way. My colleagues and I laugh bc when one of our cases makes it in the news, it’s so very rare to see lawyer names mentioned. People don’t notice or care. But you seem to.
It seems very personal to you.
I am a lawyer (I wouldn’t expect a non-lawyer to figure the claim tracing I did above out, except maybe a very good paralegal) and while my firm never goes on TMZ, we do get quoted in news articles, especially legal pubs. If we made a mistake like this about the remaining claims we had in a lawsuit in one of those, it would mean an immediate client call to do damage control. Whoever’s mistake it was would get reprimanded. People woukd “care about the details” lolol.
But Freedman is in charge of this sh!t show so maybe when he makes mistakes — like this or like not ever filing an amended complaint so that nearly all of Baldoni’s claims get dismissed *poof* — maybe the client doesn’t know how to reprimand him. Since he handled the PR so brilliantly! But on the legal part of being a lawyer, he is sucking pretty hard, turns out.
Well, I’m not entirely sure it was a mistake but in any event, the crisis PR I worked with would never suggest going out with some other statement like you’re suggesting. ‘Oh we said we’d re file 4 claims, but we actually meant 3’. It’s really silly to think anyone would care. It’s not like PR statements are written guarantees!
He should definitely say that. That would be wrong, also, so very on brand for him. He only has 2 remaining claims.
He’s not wrong. There are four claims that fall under the rubric of the two causes of actions the judge said he could replead. It’s just a difference in semantics.
lol no! Nice try! He went on tv to say he has 4 claims remaking and will include in his amended complaint, and specifically named two of those four claims as (1) intentional interference with prospective economic advantage and (2) negligent interference with prospective economic advantage. Which is a problem because the judge specifically told him in the order that those claims are dismissed with prejudice and he cannot refile.
Keep up.
You are incorrect (and extremely rude, as usual). Anyway, this lawyer went through the comparing and there are indeed four., but so closely related in nature, that it is two causes of action. You can watch, if you liike, but the don’t want to waste my time typing it all out for you. https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8MwAhm2/
I can’t access this from my phone, but whatever this TikTok person is saying appears to directly contradict what *Baldoni’s lead attorney Bryan Freedman* said yesterday when he specifically named the four distinct claims he would raise, two of which were dismissed with prejudice by the judge.
He’s didn’t say four distinct claims, he said four claims. She went through the complaint and agrees. Sorry you wasted your morning with three pages of rambling posts on a non issue, but that’s what you do, all day, every day.
DP. Lmao 🤣
I signed off and just read through a few pages and this rabid poster was going on and on about freedman (why?? Is she a scorned lover?) and ‘late’ PR statements that were ‘WRONG’!
I mean, really, who cares? The case is still ongoing, and will likely go on for quite awhile with more twists and turns.
But this obsession with a lawyer in a case??? I’ve never seen anything like it!
Is this woman mentally ill or does she think this is some sort of wise PR strategy for Blake? Post on and on about garbled details, obsessively focusing on lawyers and other things 99.99 of the public doesn’t care about?? lol
Honestly, I worry about her health, she is here 24/7, posting with a high amount of venom, and is constantly referencing reddit forums on this topic as well. Her family should intervene.
Seriously agree. She seems disconnected from reality much of the time, and is filled with such nonsensical venom… over minor things like a PR statement referencing 4 claims instead of the 2 she thinks that the lawyer should have mentioned. ?? Or a PR statement coming out the next AM instead of the night before? It’s curious she believes she knows the ‘right’ way these things should be handled. Delusions of grandeur.
My theory is it's Kat Ortega, who spams Reddit all day about Bryan Freedman. Genuinely think Kat is in love with that man.
Who is Kat Ortega?
Whoever it is posts like a borderline personality scorned lover!!!
Look, I’m thick skinned enough that this doesn’t much bother me at this point — I guess I don’t respect you enough for your dumb comment to hurt lol.
But at the same time, look at how easy it is to attempt to discredit my substantive comment about a mistake Freedman made yesterday in his legal analysis of the claims remaining in his complaint! Look how reflexively JB supporters resort to the “scorned lover” and poor borderline personality disorder accusations — both of which they have also been leveling at Lively! This is a guy you support who says he is a male feminist, and yet these tactics are as gross and dirty as this see from an MRA supporter.
I made detailed legal substantive criticism (not, like, accusations that you were tracking my IP address), and you came back with “scorned lover” and borderline personality disorder. 👌
The “mistake” that wasn’t a mistake that you droned on about for hours? That’s your defense of substance? Good lord.
Pretty sure this mistake is a mistake like I said and these other folks are getting it wrong. I think they are saying that intentional and negligent interference with prospective economic relationship are still repleadable, as parts of the "tortious interference with contractual relations or prospective economic advantage" part of the opinion. They are missing the footnote I pointed out, and also the part of that opinion where the judge gives an independent reason why these intentional/negligent interference with prospective economic relationship claims must be out: "Regarding the claims of interference with prospective economic advantage, because the Wayfarer Parties do not allege that Reynolds’ statements were defamatory, they do not allege that they were independently wrongful. See Korea Supply, 63 P.3d at 954 (“[A]n act is independently wrongful if it is unlawful, that is, if it is proscribed by some constitutional, statutory, regulatory, common law, or other determinable legal standard.”)
So even though he will let Freedman try again on the tortious interference with contractual relations, if he can actually produce a contract, Liman is saying you need a wrongful act to support an interference with prospective economic advantage claim (whether interference is intentional or negligent), and he's already said Reynolds' statement wasn't wrongful in determining that it wasn't defamatory.
And I bet that somewhere today there was some lower level associate at Willkie or Manatt who looked up the cited Korea Supply case just like I did to be absolutely sure that Freedman really couldn’t refile on the two prospective economic advantage claims (he can’t, no wrongful act), and that there are now either emails or Teams chats discussing what to do about Freedman’s dumb plan. Raise in advance with the judge? I bet not. Let Freedman waste the time and resources on putting them in the complaint, and then cite the opinion and the Korea Supply case showing the claims must fail? That’s probably the way. Unless Freedman realizes his mistake (or very probably can’t cite to a WME contract ha) and drops them.
I'm assuming someone on Freedman's team will figure it out tbh.
I think lawyers at my firm would sooner commit seppuku than (1) appear on TMZ; or (2) appear on TMZ only to misstate the claims remaining in the case the day after the majority of our claims got booted.
Right? He looks so amateur here. Especially after the complaint he wrote got shredded by the judge.
Anonymous wrote:Meanwhile, JB supporters on reddit are combing FamilyTreeNow profiles for Lively's attorneys trying to find a connection to Liman as part of a conspiracy theory that Liman is in the tank for Lively.
Now THAT is how you stalk a lawyer, not by idly noting they seem busy with their caseload because they have a lot of high profile clients.
Lol.
They hate Liman so much that they really need to find some way to GET HIM OUT.
I think Liman is basically just hard-line judge. Remember when he wouldn’t give Lively more than one extra day on her complaint and Baldoni supporters were saying that meant he hated her? No, he is just a stickler. I don’t really think he hates Baldoni or Freedman either, tbh. If Freedman had filed a MTD, I think he might have gotten something, though Gottlieb’s complaint was honestly much more clearly supported by facts directly relating to the underlying claims.
This can also be rough on Lively if/when they go to trial. But I think Willkie and Manatt are up to speed on him now (and Gottlieb has been before him before so likely already knew).
I agree with this analysis, at least in part. I also think that it would have not mattered if Freedman amended, this judge was always going to read the litigation and fair use protections broadly.
A motion to dismiss against Lively would have been unsuccessful. The judge has to accept all her allegations as true, and she pled enough. Summary judgment, however, may be a different story, and I think that may be something Freedman pursues.
Although, can I just say that it would be A M A Z I N G if Freedman did NOT file for summary judgement, and instead issued a statement that he didn’t want to provide Lively with a roadmap for trial, and ended with something about sending Gottlieb to JoAnn Fabrics for cheese?
I think Baldoni supporters still would not revolt, but I don’t know, there are some that are actually starting to get antsy now.
One problem for the JB supporters is that Freedman has intentionally exploited their lack of legal knowledge. Many of them were fully convinced that Blake would be put on trial for stealing the movie, that Taylor Swift would be a central witness in that trial, and that Baldoni would of course prevail because look at all this celeb gossip about Blake being a mean girl who "takes over" the films she's in. If you tried to impose any kind of legal framework on that, they'd freak out and tell you that you didn't know anything, even if you just presented information about how the legal system works in a neutral, FYI way intended to inform and not to argue for Lively's side.
So as Freedman encounters these legal stumbling blocks, JB's supporters are confused because their support for JB was based on a totally false understanding of the case. For those of us who understood from the get-go that JB's claims against Lively and NYT were mostly totally untenable and largely filed for PR reasons, this doesn't really change much. This case was always really about Lively's SH/retaliation claims, it's still about that, the whole "she stole the movie" narrative was largely invented by Freedman to keep people from talking about or focusing on the SH/retaliation claims. And it worked for a while. But now we are back to where we started. But for JB supporters who genuinely believed this whole thing was really about how Lively stole a movie (that she did not steal, that still belongs to Wayfarer, and that JB and others have made a ton of money off of), it feels like the rug has been pulled out from under them. But this is the same rug we've all been standing on since Lively filed her CRD! Literally nothing has changed. But now we will actually get to discuss the SH/retaliation case and can set aside these distractions that never had much of any legal basis to begin with.
You are way overthinking this. People simply read the New York Times article and her complaint on December 21 or whenever, and then 10 days later went on the website and read Justin‘s side. After that, they just wanted fairness. Would there be repercussions for Blake taking over so much of the movie little by little, bit by bit, having her lawyer send threatening emails every two weeks, threatening to walk off the film, Stealing a PGA credit that she didn’t deserve, running up the budget, and then taking over the marketing and doing a real disservice to the themes of the story through marketing she and her husband‘s alcohol lines and her frivolous hair business that was going to flop before it even got off the ground regardless of this mess.
The threads on this website are a little different because there are so many lawyers in the DC metro area that are weighing in, but 99% of the public aren’t arguing back-and-forth legal arguments. People just want justice. And as much as people don’t like Blake if she was sexually harassed, most would want justice for her too.
If people in the public were impressed by Brian Freedman, they were impressed by the way he bought Justin‘s story forward. He did do a good job of making a compelling narrative that was easy to understand and laid out the timeline really well.
Bringing Taylor in by redacting every name but hers was genius and perhaps the biggest win anyone will get from this case. The deteriorating relationship and her not supporting Blake is devastating for Blake and Ryan. Regardless of what happens in this case, that has been a huge blow to their public image.
DP than who you are responding to, who I agree with. I think a bunch of Baldoni supporters are starting to feel betrayed by Freedman, because I am seeing their angry and questioning comments. So I don’t think PP is “overthinking” this and frankly Freedman’s team might be better off with a little “overthinking” right now because their underthinking just cost them $400M if you believe Freedman they had viable claims for that from the start like he said.
This obsession with Swift by Baldoni people is understandable, especially now with the dismissal, but … not really the point. She wants to be out, so let her be out.
Anonymous wrote:Meanwhile, JB supporters on reddit are combing FamilyTreeNow profiles for Lively's attorneys trying to find a connection to Liman as part of a conspiracy theory that Liman is in the tank for Lively.
Now THAT is how you stalk a lawyer, not by idly noting they seem busy with their caseload because they have a lot of high profile clients.
Lol.
They hate Liman so much that they really need to find some way to GET HIM OUT.
I think Liman is basically just hard-line judge. Remember when he wouldn’t give Lively more than one extra day on her complaint and Baldoni supporters were saying that meant he hated her? No, he is just a stickler. I don’t really think he hates Baldoni or Freedman either, tbh. If Freedman had filed a MTD, I think he might have gotten something, though Gottlieb’s complaint was honestly much more clearly supported by facts directly relating to the underlying claims.
This can also be rough on Lively if/when they go to trial. But I think Willkie and Manatt are up to speed on him now (and Gottlieb has been before him before so likely already knew).
I agree with this analysis, at least in part. I also think that it would have not mattered if Freedman amended, this judge was always going to read the litigation and fair use protections broadly.
A motion to dismiss against Lively would have been unsuccessful. The judge has to accept all her allegations as true, and she pled enough. Summary judgment, however, may be a different story, and I think that may be something Freedman pursues.
Although, can I just say that it would be A M A Z I N G if Freedman did NOT file for summary judgement, and instead issued a statement that he didn’t want to provide Lively with a roadmap for trial, and ended with something about sending Gottlieb to JoAnn Fabrics for cheese?
I think Baldoni supporters still would not revolt, but I don’t know, there are some that are actually starting to get antsy now.
One problem for the JB supporters is that Freedman has intentionally exploited their lack of legal knowledge. Many of them were fully convinced that Blake would be put on trial for stealing the movie, that Taylor Swift would be a central witness in that trial, and that Baldoni would of course prevail because look at all this celeb gossip about Blake being a mean girl who "takes over" the films she's in. If you tried to impose any kind of legal framework on that, they'd freak out and tell you that you didn't know anything, even if you just presented information about how the legal system works in a neutral, FYI way intended to inform and not to argue for Lively's side.
So as Freedman encounters these legal stumbling blocks, JB's supporters are confused because their support for JB was based on a totally false understanding of the case. For those of us who understood from the get-go that JB's claims against Lively and NYT were mostly totally untenable and largely filed for PR reasons, this doesn't really change much. This case was always really about Lively's SH/retaliation claims, it's still about that, the whole "she stole the movie" narrative was largely invented by Freedman to keep people from talking about or focusing on the SH/retaliation claims. And it worked for a while. But now we are back to where we started. But for JB supporters who genuinely believed this whole thing was really about how Lively stole a movie (that she did not steal, that still belongs to Wayfarer, and that JB and others have made a ton of money off of), it feels like the rug has been pulled out from under them. But this is the same rug we've all been standing on since Lively filed her CRD! Literally nothing has changed. But now we will actually get to discuss the SH/retaliation case and can set aside these distractions that never had much of any legal basis to begin with.
You are way overthinking this. People simply read the New York Times article and her complaint on December 21 or whenever, and then 10 days later went on the website and read Justin‘s side. After that, they just wanted fairness. Would there be repercussions for Blake taking over so much of the movie little by little, bit by bit, having her lawyer send threatening emails every two weeks, threatening to walk off the film, Stealing a PGA credit that she didn’t deserve, running up the budget, and then taking over the marketing and doing a real disservice to the themes of the story through marketing she and her husband‘s alcohol lines and her frivolous hair business that was going to flop before it even got off the ground regardless of this mess.
The threads on this website are a little different because there are so many lawyers in the DC metro area that are weighing in, but 99% of the public aren’t arguing back-and-forth legal arguments. People just want justice. And as much as people don’t like Blake if she was sexually harassed, most would want justice for her too.
If people in the public were impressed by Brian Freedman, they were impressed by the way he bought Justin‘s story forward. He did do a good job of making a compelling narrative that was easy to understand and laid out the timeline really well.
Bringing Taylor in by redacting every name but hers was genius and perhaps the biggest win anyone will get from this case. The deteriorating relationship and her not supporting Blake is devastating for Blake and Ryan. Regardless of what happens in this case, that has been a huge blow to their public image.
This is an excellent analysis. And to see it, it is mind boggling that this case that started off with Blake bringing a claim and blasting Justin in the NYT to the world shifting so dramatically that Blake is the subject of multiple serious claims (even if they’re not won) by multiple parties, and 95 percent of the world thinking she’s a phony liar. And her BFF, the most famous woman in the world, has dropped her very publicly. All in a few months. Gotta give credit where it’s due. The freedman side is impressive, even if none of his claims survive. The weird poster droning on about 4 claims or 2 blah blah is delusional. Justin won. Blake has lost. No one will ever trust her again.
Anonymous wrote:Reading through Liman's Opinion dismissing Wayfarer etc's claims, here were a few excerpts from the Extortion claim section that I enjoyed:
Demanding harassment free working conditions /= extortion: "Even if they turn out to be unneeded, an employee can insist on protections at workplace for sexual harassment without being accused of extortion. If an employer accedes, it cannot later claim to be a victim of the employee’s wrongful threats."
Hoist by his own petard: "Although the Wayfarer Parties allege that they did not believe Lively deserved a producer credit or p.g.a. mark, Dkt. No. 50 ¶¶ 153–155, they also allege that Lively took over significant production responsibilities, see id. ¶ 296 (stating that Lively used baseless sexual harassment allegations “to assert unilateral control over every aspect of the production”); id. ¶ 344 (alleging that Lively seized creative control over the production and the Wayfarer Parties “were deprived of the opportunity to produce, edit, and market a film”); cf. United States v. Jackson, 180 F.3d 55, 70–72 (2d Cir.), on reh’g, 196 F.3d 383 (2d Cir. 1999) (suggesting that a threat is not wrongful if it has a “nexus to a plausible claim of right”)."
Hard bargaining /= extortion: "The fact that a plaintiff decides it is more financially beneficial to acquiesce to a demand than to sue does not mean the plaintiff lacks an adequate remedy in damages. Having made their decision, the Wayfarer Parties cannot now seek to recover in damages for what they would have obtained had they not agreed and had Lively promoted some different version of the film more consistent with the Wayfarer Parties’ artistic vision."
I also thought it was interesting in the TMZ clip that Freedman said he was given leave by the judge to file an amended complaint for the 4 following claims, because Judge Liman specifically forbids Freedman from amending for two of these lol:
1. Intentional interference of a contractual agreement (a/g Lively and Reynolds);
2. Intentional interference with prospective economic advantage (a/g Lively and Reynolds);
3. Negligent interference with prospective economic advantage (a/g Lively and Reynolds? not sure);
4. Breach of implied duty of covenant and good faith and fair dealing (only a/g Lively).
When you look at the opinion itself, Liman explicitly says in two places that he grants Wayfarer etc leave to amend only for the following two claims: tortious interference with contract and breach of implied contract.
And footnote 66 p.130 specifically lays out that the court will not permit amendment for the following claims (some of which appear on Freedman's list):
* False light
* Breach of implied covenant;
* Intentional or negligent interference with prospective economic relations;
* Promissory fraud.
If you specifically go back to Wayfarer's Amended Complaint and look at the counts, you can track that Judge Liman means to allow Wayfarer to amend ONLY for the following:
1. Liman says "Tortious interference with contract" which tracks to Count 5 in the amended complaint: Intentional Interference with Contractual Relations (involving the WME interference);
2. Liman says "Breach of implied contract" which tracks to Count 4 in the amended complaint: Breach of Implied Covenant of Good Faith and Fair Dealing (involving the contract, if it exists, between Lively and Wayfarer).
Freedman says that he is going to include negligent and intentional interference with prospective economic advantage in the amended complaint, which tracks to counts 7 and 6 of the amended complaint involving the WME contract. However, Liman explicitly forbids Freedman for amending these interference with prospective economic advantage claims due to futility! He explains that the failure of the defamation claim against Reynolds is fatal to these economic advantage claims, since interference needs to be through a wrongful act and Liman found Reynolds statement could not be considered as such.
So, a day later and Freedman is already spouting wild nonsense and either does not understand Judge Liman's opinion better than me, who looked at this for 20 minutes, or alternatively Freedman has decided to explicitly ignore it. A++ as usual Mssr. Freedman.
This is excellent, thank you for putting it together.
Freedman looks very out of the loop on this -- no reply until Tuesday and then his response seems to have factual errors that will come back to bite him. Either he'll finally read the decision closely enough to understand they cannot replead everything he says he's going to, OR he'll replead it all and get bench slapped for violating the judge's order.
Dp and I don’t post much on here but isn’t freedman Baldonis lawyer? How is he ‘out of the loop’ for not responding to a court decision from Monday on… Tuesday… ? Or do you mean something else? Because that seems pretty timely to me!!
DP but in this high profile cases it's typical for the lawyers to comment immediately in the articles that come out in the hours after the decision drops, even if it's just to say they plan to appeal. So yes I think it's unusual that Freedman waited a day, and then in addition, isn't reading the decision correctly according to PP, even with that extra time.
Dp. I’m a litigator and have worked with crisis PR for some high profile litigations, and I don’t agree. We would never want to completely rush a statement without taking a beat to pause and gather our thoughts. As long as a statement came out around the same news cycle, it would be fine and perfectly industry typical (not that there’s a hard and fast rule as this Pp seems to want to think - lol).
As far as not reading the decision ‘correctly’, that only matters when they file! It seems that the point they wants to make is that they plan to continue, and that’s really the only message that matters. Totally standard stuff ime.
I can see taking more than 4 hours to respond because it’s a longer decision.
But if, as you say, you need to “gather your thoughts,” that extra time should really ensure that your lead attorney does not then turn around and get the claims you are refiling wrong. You would not see Manatt or Willkie making this stupid mistake tbh. You don’t overstate what you’re going to come back fighting on, either to your client (who Freedman should have consulted with before going public on TMZ lol) or to the public.
This just emphasizes to me how Freedman is absolutely obsessed with PR to the point where him being on TV is more important than what he is actually saying. Wtf is wrong with this dude? He took a whole day and didn’t figure out his remaining claims properly, which I did in 20 minutes? Remember Succession? This is sh!t show at the clown factory stuff.
I don’t think anyone really cares about the details, just the overall message.
Do you know these lawyers personally? Are you a lawyer? I’ve heard of freedman because he represents famous clients, but I would never normally see the names of lawyers in PR statements and I think 99.99 percent of people don’t know or care either way. My colleagues and I laugh bc when one of our cases makes it in the news, it’s so very rare to see lawyer names mentioned. People don’t notice or care. But you seem to.
It seems very personal to you.
I am a lawyer (I wouldn’t expect a non-lawyer to figure the claim tracing I did above out, except maybe a very good paralegal) and while my firm never goes on TMZ, we do get quoted in news articles, especially legal pubs. If we made a mistake like this about the remaining claims we had in a lawsuit in one of those, it would mean an immediate client call to do damage control. Whoever’s mistake it was would get reprimanded. People woukd “care about the details” lolol.
But Freedman is in charge of this sh!t show so maybe when he makes mistakes — like this or like not ever filing an amended complaint so that nearly all of Baldoni’s claims get dismissed *poof* — maybe the client doesn’t know how to reprimand him. Since he handled the PR so brilliantly! But on the legal part of being a lawyer, he is sucking pretty hard, turns out.
Well, I’m not entirely sure it was a mistake but in any event, the crisis PR I worked with would never suggest going out with some other statement like you’re suggesting. ‘Oh we said we’d re file 4 claims, but we actually meant 3’. It’s really silly to think anyone would care. It’s not like PR statements are written guarantees!
He should definitely say that. That would be wrong, also, so very on brand for him. He only has 2 remaining claims.
He’s not wrong. There are four claims that fall under the rubric of the two causes of actions the judge said he could replead. It’s just a difference in semantics.
lol no! Nice try! He went on tv to say he has 4 claims remaking and will include in his amended complaint, and specifically named two of those four claims as (1) intentional interference with prospective economic advantage and (2) negligent interference with prospective economic advantage. Which is a problem because the judge specifically told him in the order that those claims are dismissed with prejudice and he cannot refile.
Keep up.
You are incorrect (and extremely rude, as usual). Anyway, this lawyer went through the comparing and there are indeed four., but so closely related in nature, that it is two causes of action. You can watch, if you liike, but the don’t want to waste my time typing it all out for you. https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8MwAhm2/
I can’t access this from my phone, but whatever this TikTok person is saying appears to directly contradict what *Baldoni’s lead attorney Bryan Freedman* said yesterday when he specifically named the four distinct claims he would raise, two of which were dismissed with prejudice by the judge.
He’s didn’t say four distinct claims, he said four claims. She went through the complaint and agrees. Sorry you wasted your morning with three pages of rambling posts on a non issue, but that’s what you do, all day, every day.
DP. Lmao 🤣
I signed off and just read through a few pages and this rabid poster was going on and on about freedman (why?? Is she a scorned lover?) and ‘late’ PR statements that were ‘WRONG’!
I mean, really, who cares? The case is still ongoing, and will likely go on for quite awhile with more twists and turns.
But this obsession with a lawyer in a case??? I’ve never seen anything like it!
Is this woman mentally ill or does she think this is some sort of wise PR strategy for Blake? Post on and on about garbled details, obsessively focusing on lawyers and other things 99.99 of the public doesn’t care about?? lol
Honestly, I worry about her health, she is here 24/7, posting with a high amount of venom, and is constantly referencing reddit forums on this topic as well. Her family should intervene.
Seriously agree. She seems disconnected from reality much of the time, and is filled with such nonsensical venom… over minor things like a PR statement referencing 4 claims instead of the 2 she thinks that the lawyer should have mentioned. ?? Or a PR statement coming out the next AM instead of the night before? It’s curious she believes she knows the ‘right’ way these things should be handled. Delusions of grandeur.
My theory is it's Kat Ortega, who spams Reddit all day about Bryan Freedman. Genuinely think Kat is in love with that man.
Who is Kat Ortega?
Whoever it is posts like a borderline personality scorned lover!!!
Look, I’m thick skinned enough that this doesn’t much bother me at this point — I guess I don’t respect you enough for your dumb comment to hurt lol.
But at the same time, look at how easy it is to attempt to discredit my substantive comment about a mistake Freedman made yesterday in his legal analysis of the claims remaining in his complaint! Look how reflexively JB supporters resort to the “scorned lover” and poor borderline personality disorder accusations — both of which they have also been leveling at Lively! This is a guy you support who says he is a male feminist, and yet these tactics are as gross and dirty as this see from an MRA supporter.
I made detailed legal substantive criticism (not, like, accusations that you were tracking my IP address), and you came back with “scorned lover” and borderline personality disorder. 👌
The “mistake” that wasn’t a mistake that you droned on about for hours? That’s your defense of substance? Good lord.
Pretty sure this mistake is a mistake like I said and these other folks are getting it wrong. I think they are saying that intentional and negligent interference with prospective economic relationship are still repleadable, as parts of the "tortious interference with contractual relations or prospective economic advantage" part of the opinion. They are missing the footnote I pointed out, and also the part of that opinion where the judge gives an independent reason why these intentional/negligent interference with prospective economic relationship claims must be out: "Regarding the claims of interference with prospective economic advantage, because the Wayfarer Parties do not allege that Reynolds’ statements were defamatory, they do not allege that they were independently wrongful. See Korea Supply, 63 P.3d at 954 (“[A]n act is independently wrongful if it is unlawful, that is, if it is proscribed by some constitutional, statutory, regulatory, common law, or other determinable legal standard.”)
So even though he will let Freedman try again on the tortious interference with contractual relations, if he can actually produce a contract, Liman is saying you need a wrongful act to support an interference with prospective economic advantage claim (whether interference is intentional or negligent), and he's already said Reynolds' statement wasn't wrongful in determining that it wasn't defamatory.
And I bet that somewhere today there was some lower level associate at Willkie or Manatt who looked up the cited Korea Supply case just like I did to be absolutely sure that Freedman really couldn’t refile on the two prospective economic advantage claims (he can’t, no wrongful act), and that there are now either emails or Teams chats discussing what to do about Freedman’s dumb plan. Raise in advance with the judge? I bet not. Let Freedman waste the time and resources on putting them in the complaint, and then cite the opinion and the Korea Supply case showing the claims must fail? That’s probably the way. Unless Freedman realizes his mistake (or very probably can’t cite to a WME contract ha) and drops them.
I'm assuming someone on Freedman's team will figure it out tbh.
I think lawyers at my firm would sooner commit seppuku than (1) appear on TMZ; or (2) appear on TMZ only to misstate the claims remaining in the case the day after the majority of our claims got booted.
And those types, the bookish ones, will figure it out. I would not want to be the one to tell Freedman though.
Anonymous wrote:Meanwhile, JB supporters on reddit are combing FamilyTreeNow profiles for Lively's attorneys trying to find a connection to Liman as part of a conspiracy theory that Liman is in the tank for Lively.
Now THAT is how you stalk a lawyer, not by idly noting they seem busy with their caseload because they have a lot of high profile clients.
Lol.
They hate Liman so much that they really need to find some way to GET HIM OUT.
I think Liman is basically just hard-line judge. Remember when he wouldn’t give Lively more than one extra day on her complaint and Baldoni supporters were saying that meant he hated her? No, he is just a stickler. I don’t really think he hates Baldoni or Freedman either, tbh. If Freedman had filed a MTD, I think he might have gotten something, though Gottlieb’s complaint was honestly much more clearly supported by facts directly relating to the underlying claims.
This can also be rough on Lively if/when they go to trial. But I think Willkie and Manatt are up to speed on him now (and Gottlieb has been before him before so likely already knew).
I agree with this analysis, at least in part. I also think that it would have not mattered if Freedman amended, this judge was always going to read the litigation and fair use protections broadly.
A motion to dismiss against Lively would have been unsuccessful. The judge has to accept all her allegations as true, and she pled enough. Summary judgment, however, may be a different story, and I think that may be something Freedman pursues.
Although, can I just say that it would be A M A Z I N G if Freedman did NOT file for summary judgement, and instead issued a statement that he didn’t want to provide Lively with a roadmap for trial, and ended with something about sending Gottlieb to JoAnn Fabrics for cheese?
I think Baldoni supporters still would not revolt, but I don’t know, there are some that are actually starting to get antsy now.
One problem for the JB supporters is that Freedman has intentionally exploited their lack of legal knowledge. Many of them were fully convinced that Blake would be put on trial for stealing the movie, that Taylor Swift would be a central witness in that trial, and that Baldoni would of course prevail because look at all this celeb gossip about Blake being a mean girl who "takes over" the films she's in. If you tried to impose any kind of legal framework on that, they'd freak out and tell you that you didn't know anything, even if you just presented information about how the legal system works in a neutral, FYI way intended to inform and not to argue for Lively's side.
So as Freedman encounters these legal stumbling blocks, JB's supporters are confused because their support for JB was based on a totally false understanding of the case. For those of us who understood from the get-go that JB's claims against Lively and NYT were mostly totally untenable and largely filed for PR reasons, this doesn't really change much. This case was always really about Lively's SH/retaliation claims, it's still about that, the whole "she stole the movie" narrative was largely invented by Freedman to keep people from talking about or focusing on the SH/retaliation claims. And it worked for a while. But now we are back to where we started. But for JB supporters who genuinely believed this whole thing was really about how Lively stole a movie (that she did not steal, that still belongs to Wayfarer, and that JB and others have made a ton of money off of), it feels like the rug has been pulled out from under them. But this is the same rug we've all been standing on since Lively filed her CRD! Literally nothing has changed. But now we will actually get to discuss the SH/retaliation case and can set aside these distractions that never had much of any legal basis to begin with.
You are way overthinking this. People simply read the New York Times article and her complaint on December 21 or whenever, and then 10 days later went on the website and read Justin‘s side. After that, they just wanted fairness. Would there be repercussions for Blake taking over so much of the movie little by little, bit by bit, having her lawyer send threatening emails every two weeks, threatening to walk off the film, Stealing a PGA credit that she didn’t deserve, running up the budget, and then taking over the marketing and doing a real disservice to the themes of the story through marketing she and her husband‘s alcohol lines and her frivolous hair business that was going to flop before it even got off the ground regardless of this mess.
The threads on this website are a little different because there are so many lawyers in the DC metro area that are weighing in, but 99% of the public aren’t arguing back-and-forth legal arguments. People just want justice. And as much as people don’t like Blake if she was sexually harassed, most would want justice for her too.
If people in the public were impressed by Brian Freedman, they were impressed by the way he bought Justin‘s story forward. He did do a good job of making a compelling narrative that was easy to understand and laid out the timeline really well.
Bringing Taylor in by redacting every name but hers was genius and perhaps the biggest win anyone will get from this case. The deteriorating relationship and her not supporting Blake is devastating for Blake and Ryan. Regardless of what happens in this case, that has been a huge blow to their public image.
This is an excellent analysis. And to see it, it is mind boggling that this case that started off with Blake bringing a claim and blasting Justin in the NYT to the world shifting so dramatically that Blake is the subject of multiple serious claims (even if they’re not won) by multiple parties, and 95 percent of the world thinking she’s a phony liar. And her BFF, the most famous woman in the world, has dropped her very publicly. All in a few months. Gotta give credit where it’s due. The freedman side is impressive, even if none of his claims survive. The weird poster droning on about 4 claims or 2 blah blah is delusional. Justin won. Blake has lost. No one will ever trust her again.
“droning on and on” about which of Baldoni’s claims survive lol. Babe, pleading your claims properly matters, and that’s why you guys are having such a totes sh!tty week. Sorry not sorry.
Now Baldoni is a male feminist hypocrite who misused defamation claims to bring a $400M lawsuit against the woman who accused him of harassing her and who he promised not to retaliate against, similar to what other accused harassers have done. And it’s not over yet. Your boy should probably stay in Hawaii.
If it's so not a big deal that Justin's claims were dismissed, I wonder why Daily Mail has a story today about the judge's brother's connection to Lively, per "online attention" and "social media buzz." Totally organic of course. DM was simply monitoring social media and came upon this important and newsworthy story.