by Structured Settlement Watchdog
According to Connecticut court records the plaintiff has withdrawn its action in the matter of Lisa Macomber et al. v Travelers Property and Casualty et al. (Docket HHD-CV-99-4022124-S).
Despite not achieving class action status last year, attorney Ralph Stone's 8 year effort was apparently not in vain. Some structured settlement industry historians might say the negative publicity surrounding this case has resulted in the elimination of certain "deals" that might have been de rigueur in the past between certain folks, present company excluded!
- One wonders why Richard B. Risk, Jr, of The Risk Law Firm in Tulsa Oklahoma has not posted about this given that there are numerous case documents, including the class action status reversal, posted on the Risk Law Firm website. On the other hand, given the way Risk handled coverage of the "sovereign immunity issue" in Sistrunk v United States of America I am not at all surprised.
- What does Patrick Hindert say now ? Hindert considered the Macomber to be significant, as evidenced by his three prior posts on the matter. Despite clearly being aware of the Macomber settlement, even Hindert has not written anything further about it. Seems that "squiggly diagrams" for Lawyers 2.0 were deemed to hold greater importance.
One hopes that certain fringe factor structured settlement brokers and settlement planners will cease implying that the alleged behavior that gave rise to the Macomber lawsuit now applies to every insurer or even most insurers and members of their industry.
Indeed the eventual exposure of those structured settlement brokers and settlement planners currently taking undisclosed factoring fees on the sale of structured settlement payment rights (much of which may be undisclosed and unconsented to by the seller) and how they directly impact the bottom line for a person who is an already deperate financial situation, has far more serious implications.
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