Hulk Hogan & Gawker To Enter Mediation As Sex Tape Trial Approaches

As first reported yesterday by Capital New York, Hulk Hogan’s lawsuit against Gawker took a curious turn yesterday during a brief hearing in Pinellas County Court. With most of the lawyers appearing via phone conference, the stated goal of the hearing was for Judge Pamela Campbell to deliver her outstanding rulings on matters not decided during last week’s marathon-length hearing. After ruling in favor of Gawker on one motion, she suggested the two sides re-enter mediation to try to come to a settlement. The perception of Campbell from those following the case is that her rulings have been heavily slanted towards Hogan (but not necessarily to the point of improprieties or anything like that), so what happened yesterday came as a bit of a shock.

The motion granted was filed on December 22nd, Gawker had filed requested “access to corrected and unredacted DVDs produced by the FBI” stemming from their lawsuit against the federal law enforcement agency. Back in 2012, the FBI had investigated Hogan’s allegations that he was being extorted by whoever had stolen security camera videos of him having sex with Heather Cole at the home she shared wth then husband Bubba the Love Sponge Clem. That led to a sting operation where the FBI seized the three DVDs of Hogan and Cole, and the video of the sting itself took up two DVDs, so the FBI ended up producing five DVDs to Gawker in their lawsuit to get the records of the investigation. Gawker had issues early on with the DVDs having glitches and edits that shouldn’t be there, but it was eventually rectified. Only the lawyers for each side can see the videos, which they were not sent copies of, and Gawker wanted to see them again.

udge Campbell watched all five DVDs over the weekend, and it seems as if she noticed something that she thinks the lawyers for both sides missed. “I know that at our hearing on all of the motions in limine, which I believe was last July 1st, there were motions — there was a motion in limine from the plaintiff on the issue of racial slurs, and that part of it we need to revisit. I think after you all have had an opportunity to review the DVDs, you will see that.” It’s difficult to know exactly what they discussed or even what was being argued other than that it involved Hogan’s use of racial slurs, but she also added that “after the attorneys have an opportunity to look at those DVDs, I’m going to suggest that the attorneys or that you go back to mediation. I’m not going to require it, but I think you’ll see why.” She also made a point of saying that the lawyers should re-listen to the audio CDs of the sting operation before they get the opportunity to watch the DVDs.

With so much of the relevant information being sealed/confidential, understanding why she thinks they should try to settle is going to be incredibly difficult. There had been two previous attempts at mediation and obviously neither went well. Hogan attorney Charles Harder told Capital New York that the results of the next mediation session “depends on what Gawker’s side has to say. If they are going to say what they’ve said in the past, I don’t see any chance of settlement.” Harder also made news yesterday for representing another plaintiff in a new, otherwise unrelated lawsuit against Gawker.