Topic: Legal Advice / Answering Legal Questions - page 3. (Read 4149 times)

I am curious why you did not discuss potential civil/criminal liability for selling insurance without a license, illegal wagering/bookmaking, selling securities without a license, and selling unregistered securities, especially in light of your experience with business law.

These seem like significant issues that X, Y, and Z would want to address, especially if their explanation for why they're not part of A's criminal enterprise is "We're just ordinary businessmen selling insurance/bookmaking/securities!"

Could you explain your understanding of the relationship between "conflict of laws" and criminal charges? I am only familiar with that term being used in a civil context.

Attorneys fees range quite hugely depending on the case.  Class Actions of this type are pretty much only taken on a contingency fee basis.  The ethical rule for how much an attorney can charge only says that "the fee must be reasonable."  This is in light of all of the circumstances in the case.  Generally, a contingency fee of 33% is considered reasonable.  This may include the cost of the litigation (court costs, expert witnesses, etc.) or it may not.  That's negotiated between the clients and the attorney.  And then in a class action case, the court usually must approve the fee since it can be so large.  Now, in this case, I don't think anyone would claim that 33% is unreasonable.  This is an extremely novel case.  Never before been litigated.  It will require countless hours of time and research. 

But the good thing about a contingency fee case, is that there really isn't any downside for the plaintiffs if you lose, other than you lose.  You don't pay the attorney fee unless you win the case.  That's the very definition of a contingency fee. 

The bottom line is how much does pirate have left?  And I don't know how you find that out without hiring an attorney with expertise in securities fraud and doing some heavy duty investigation. 

A criminal action doesn't cost anything, but you can't bring that yourself.  Only a government employee such as a state district attorney/attorney general, or a U.S. Attorney.  The good thing about a criminal case is that the bad guy can go to jail.  The bad thing about a criminal case, is that it is not designed to compensate the victims.  The SEC tries in these cases to do that, but that just isn't the primary goal of the criminal prosecution. 

And any BTC tips are always appreciated.  I haven't posted an address yet in this thread, so here ya go.  Thanks again!   1Hu8aScogCkcphFVcR376y1T2mMdqiSd1r

Thanks! That clarifies things a lot. I had already figured that a % based agreement would be the only practical way to go about it. Do you have a ballpark figure of what we might be looking at in terms of total fees for a class action? Otherwise, would a criminal action cost us anything? I can see this possibly costing more than what we might stand to gain.

I'll be sure to send a BTC your way when I get the chance.

Excellent question.  The only way what you can achieve what you are asking for is if a class action lawsuit is filed.  A criminal undertaking by the Securities and Exchange Commission or the Justice Department would not allow for this result. 

Basically a class action lawsuit would be filed against pirate and whoever else.  At that point a lead or lead plaintiffs would be nominated, and the court would either grant or deny the Rule 23 Class Action lawsuit to proceed.  The lead plaintiffs are just the names on the lawsuit basically.  Now at any time the "plaintiffs" (all of the injured parties) could agree amongst themselves in the form of a contract as to how they will split any proceeds.  At this point it could really only be decided upon a percentage basis after legal fees and litigation cost, as no one knows how much there actually is left. 

There is no rule of ethics that would prevent this (there is an ethics rule that dictates the procedure the attorney must take in this agreement Model Rules of Professional Conduct 1.8(g)), and I cannot think of any contractual rule that would bar this type of contract.

(continuing from the previous thread)


I don't believe that's quite an accurate assessment. AFAIK, for most of the PPTs, either there was no insurance and the risk and bearers of that risk were explicitly stated publicly in their terms, or else for the insured PPTs (at least those that made good on that insurance, and there were some), would not have been betting against their clients, since they would need to reserve money aside in unrelated assets in order to pay out. In short, just like any other insurance company, they were betting that they would NOT have to pay out (the only situation in which they would have made any extra money), ie that pirate would not default.

Also, many/most of the PPTs are not US based, which makes them much more difficult targets.

I do have a question, though. Assuming we do manage to force pirate and associates to cough up, either by returning what was stolen and/or by liquidating their property, is there a reasonable process that we could arrange a legal agreement for how those funds will be distributed before we get a ruling? I could only imagine a series of disasters following without such an agreement.

The areas I know best are criminal law, tort law (personal injury/wrongful death/defamation/etc.), and business law.  

Shoot me an email at ncontendere AT gmail.com and provide me with as much detail as you think I need.  Make me an offer on what you think the answer/advice is worth based on how complicated it is.  Most of your questions I'll be able to answer right away.  Some might require research if it is a highly technical matter, and obviously I would ask for a little bit more for those issues.  

I am only knowledgeable about American law.  Sorry EU.  But make sure you tell me what state you are in, as the laws are very specific to each state.  This is especially important if your question is of a criminal nature.  

Hope to help as many of you as possible!