News about the civil case against Nurmi (the interpretation of which is complicated, and much of it above my pay grade):
Karen Clark's husband and law partner is the attorney of record for the civil suit against Nurmi. A new entry on the Superior Court docket (Jan 23) indicates that he filed a "Certificate of Agreement" requiring a response by Nurmi.
The Agreement refers to AZ's civil case law/rules about mandatory arbitration. If damages resulting from the alleged wrongdoing by a defendant do not exceed $50,000, both parties (defendant & plaintiff) are required to resolve the case through arbitration, not through the trial process.
Again,the 's attorney filed that certificate of Agreement. Why?
** He believes Nurmi's profits from his book & media appearances do not exceed $50k.
**He wants to force Nurmi to provide evidence about how much profit (lol) book/media appearances Nurmi earned, without having to go to trial (the only other method of obtaining this info from Nurmi).
*If Nurmi earned under $50k, he will be forced into arbitration. No escape.
______________
Arbitration in AZ is conducted by a panel of attorneys, not a judge. There almost certainly would be no public record of the process.
Could Nurmi prevail in arbitration? That's the part that is way beyond my pay grade.
Nurmi admitted in his disbarment consent that he did break attorney-client privilege. If this civil suit is arbitrated solely on that global issue, Nurmi loses. But can it be? Dunno.
From the civil complaint against him, it seems that Nurmi may have conceded that SOME of what he included in his book broke privilege, but not all, and not on any of the central topics for which he has asserted the waived privilege herself by attacking him in that post-conviction interview.
Many of those precise topics are alleged in the civil complaint to be evidence of his violation of attorney-client privilege and of his fiduciary duty to the .
Rereading the 48 page complaint against Nurmi in the context of arbritration, not a trial, being the most likely avenue , what's really obvious is that most of the complaint is irrelevant to the legal issues at hand. Instead, it clearly serves the 's purpose of sliming Nurmi & of peddling her delusions ,with impunity, and without Nurmi being able to reply in public:
** that he used photos of her nether regions being as a screensaver, etc),
**gets to assert her own "innocence" in trial strategy (Nurmi wanted to dirty Travis's reputation & hurt his family, she didn't),
**gets to make the absurd claim that had Nurmi followed her instructions, she would have put on a different defense (not self-defense) and won.
If the suit is entirely about civil liability for breaking privilege, we won't hear Nurmi's defense on any of that, because NONE of it is relevant to the issues of whether or not Nurmi illegally profited from breaking attorney-client privilege/violated his fiduciary duty to the , and whether or not he can be forced to relinquish any or all of his profits from doing so.
The only other relevant charge in the complaint, more implicit than directly asserted, is that Nurmi's choice of defense and trial strategy were based on his own self interest, that being his (supposed) intention from the beginning of trial to profit from writing a book, so the more salacious the trial, the more he would profit.
(Good luck proving any of that charge).
Last thought: I've wondered how this civil case could possibly proceed while her appeals are still pending, given that Nurmi is allowed to spill EVERYTHING about his interactions with the in order to defend himself. The likely answer - arbitration.
