Link to Berman decision

http://www.nysd.uscourts.gov/cases/show.php?db=special&id=484


Great reading. Will be dissected by Stradley, McCann Wallach. But waiting on the Munson analysis LOL.

Everybody and their mother is hitting that site.

robertweathers said:

Everybody and their mother is hitting that site.

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Yes ... but worth the wait ... have to go find a a big frame for it.

Scathing without using any scathing words. Very nicely done. Total win for Brady.

I particularly like that "independent" is consistently in quotation marks.

Berman wrote up three points on which he felt Goodell violated the law -- the high deference owed arbitrators means, in particular, that to overturn their results you have to find they violated the law. Then he said in effect "That's plenty to justify my decision; I won't bother adjudicating three other claims Brady made."

I cannot even hit the site just says loading. Not a good day to be the IT guy supporting that server and site.

I read the whole thing. The following were my takeaways. Please note, I have no legal background, so if I've misunderstood something, please feel free to call me out. Just posting this for people that can't access the document:

Suspension is vacated. Used Bountygate and Peterson-Rice cases for precedent in many spots. Quoted Tagliabue a lot. Basically Brady didn't have proper notice he could be suspended, Wells isn't independent, and Brady didn't have access to documents at the arbitration that he should have.

What I found interesting is there's a note at the end that basically says he makes no judgement on Brady's other claims- basically that the investigation was BS and no crime was committed on the basis that it doesn't even matter if wrongdoing occurred or not given how the punishment was handed down. (Essentially, Brady was being punished for the wrongdoing of others and that's never been done via Law of the Shop in the NFL. Since it wasn't Brady's wrongdoing anyway, it doesn't matter if wrongdoing occurred or not.)

Hope this is helpful.

Berman actually concludes that 3 of the claims by Brady were justified and were the basis for vacating the award. They were lack of notice, access to Pash and access to all investigative files including witness interview notes. Then he goes further and saids here are 4-5 more claims by Brady that I didn't feel the need to explore since the other 3 were enough to vacate. Left more open items for the appeal process. Couldn't be more in favor of Brady.

If NFL repunishes, I would think they have to allow Pash and access to all the notes. Then still deal with all the other claims by Brady.

I love me some Berman.

rainmaker said:

If NFL repunishes, I would think they have to allow Pash and access to all the notes. Then still deal with all the other claims by Brady.

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Doesn't the lack of notice disallow this? I thought if that was a reason for vacating the NFL could appeal but they couldn't re-punish. Am I mistaken?

Oswlek said:

Doesn't the lack of notice disallow this? I thought if that was a reason for vacating the NFL could appeal but they couldn't re-punish. Am I mistaken?

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You are correct.