Judge Dismisses WWE Wrestlers' Lawsuits Over CTE And Concussions

A federal judge has dismissed a series of lawsuits by former professional wrestlers claiming that they developed brain injuries from repeated head trauma. Ring of Fire’s Mike Papantonio and Farron Cousins discuss this issue.

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A federal judge has dismissed a series of lawsuits by former professional wrestlers claiming that they developed brain injuries from repeated head trauma. No surprise here. When I looked at this story Farron, the thing that struck me is there's really two sides to this. First of all, I always begin with a very suspicious story, very disappointing story when I see any federal judge dismissing a case that really should be heard by the jury. There's no reason that a judge should dismiss it unless the lawyer simply hasn't done their job. The lawyer might not have come forward with another proof. Might not have had experts to come in and establish the kind of proof they need. They may just be bad lawyers. That's the first prong of this story.

The second prong is the lawyer part. That is people don't understand. You can hire a lawyer. For example, most of these lawyers that handle cases like this do it on a contingency fee basis, and here's the problem. You got some advertiser out there that doesn't even know where the courthouse is most of the time. When you see these big massive advertisers, 1-800-Auto, that kind of stuff. Most of the time, if you really drill down, they're not really even trial lawyers. They're lawyers. They have a law degree, but if you ask them where the courthouse was or how to get there, they'd have no clue. So it's possible that this lawyer just dropped the ball. When I see a story where a federal judge dismisses a lawsuit, especially as important as this, when a jury could hear the facts and make a decision. Who's the judge to say as a matter of law, this is not a case. I'm gonna dismiss it. That's a jury question. What's your take?

It is absolutely. I wanna hot on your point about the lawyers in just a second, but to talk about this specific one real quick. You had 53 professional wrestlers, former professional wrestlers, and they said all these cases were filed after 2007. We received repeated head trauma from years in the ring. They said the WWE who the lawsuit was against, didn't even know about it until 2007 the judge says. All your claims know that's bunk because they warned you in 2007. If we look at the NFL cases, they knew in 1994, so you can't tell me that this judge said, well if this one major organization knew about it in 1994, it took 13 years for Vince McMahon or whoever to say huh, maybe head injuries are a problem here too. No the science was out there. They know. This should have gone to a jury to let them decide. Make the case.

Exactly. Look, there's a lot of things a jury could decide. They could say, well first of all, you had clear knowledge of the problem, you chose to do it anyway, we're not gonna fine for you. They could've said, well we don't even ... This judge as a matter of law says she doesn't even believe in CTE. She doesn't think it's a compensable kind of injury. Here's the problem we've talked about so many times. We always focus on the supreme court. Right now Kavanaugh is the [talkie 00:03:10]. So important. What's gonna happen with Kavanaugh. But what everybody misses is all these federal judges. If these federal judges at lower levels. They're the ones who do most of the damage. The new trend is, these new appointments to the federal judiciary, it's not just Republicans. We get these emails. Oh this is Trump. This is Trump. No. Democrats are even worse than Republicans, if you can imagine, on this issue. Here's why.

The Democrats always appoint these ... I don't know whether this woman is appointed federal or Democrat or Republican, but we do know there's a pattern to it. They get these federal judges out of corporate silk stocking law firms. They never have any kinship with consumers at all.