the voice - nfl retiree newsletter, vol 1, issue 4

Hausfe ld LLP & Zel le Hofmann* Volume I , Issue 4

June 2012

I N S I D E T H I S I S S U E :

THE VOICE An Independent Publication Concerning NFL Retiree Rights & Benefits

Junior Seau, age 43 Ray Easterling, age 62 Dave Duerson, age 50 May 2, 2012 April 19, 2012 February 17, 2011

John Grimsley, age 45 Andre Waters, age 44 Terry Long, age 45 February 6, 2008 November 20, 2006 June 7, 2005

Mike Webster, age 50 September 24, 2002

Concussions and Health Dr. Daniel Amen

2

Easterling’s Widow to Keep Fighting Mike Tierney, NYTimes

3

Veterans, Athletes & Brain Disease Nicholas Kristof, NYTimes

5

Brain Ailments in Veterans & Athletes James Dao, NYTimes

6

DeMaurice Smith - What He Knew and When He Knew It

8

Concussions & Re-cent Retirements

9

NFL Attacks CA Work-ers Comp System Ron Mix, Atty & HOFer

10

Gridiron Greats Assit Fund News

13

NFL Agrees to Pay 51% of Widow Benefits

14

NFLPA Widows Peti-tion

15

Litigation Updates 16

“The Court recognizes and acknowledges the plight of the retired players...” Judge Susan R. Nelson

Order of May 29, 2012 @ pg. 26

“Traumatic brain injuries represent some of the most severe injuries known to affect football players. Furthermore, the long-lasting effects of these injuries

can be devastating.”

NFLPA Executive Director, DeMaurice Smith

Testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives, Oct. 28, 2009

COMMEMORATIVE ISSUE

Volume I , Issue 4

“It is without question that

NFL players are at a heightened

risk for cognitive impairment and

dementia” Dr. Daniel Amen

CONCUSSIONS AND HEALTH

In 1905, eighteen colligate football players died from injuries sustained while playing American football. Then President Teddy Roosevelt summoned the Presidents of several colleges and universities to the Oval Office and ordered them to clean-up the game and make the sport safer for the players. The meeting resulted in many rule changes and eventually led to the creation of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). Today, football is without question a safer game then it was in 1905, however it is a long way from being as safe as it needs to or could be. Players continue to be at risk. According to Dr. Daniel G. Amen, founder and medical director of the Amen Clinics, Inc., “playing football frequently causes brain damage.” Since 2007, when Dr. Amen was asked by members of the Retired NFL Players Associa-tion to study the affects of football on brain health, Dr. Amen has issued numerous re-ports on the subject. At least two studies principally lead by Dr. Daniel G. Amen reviewed medical data that suggests “that playing professional football is associated with a significantly higher risk for permanent brain damage.” In another study it was noted that “Mild traumatic brain injury results from repetitive subconcussive impacts to the head in football players at the high school, collegiate and professional level are vulnerable to the cognitive deficits and long-term neurodegenera-tive complications that may accompany it. It is without question that NFL players are at a heightened risk for cognitive impairment and dementia” Repetitive head traumas of the type sustained by NFL players both on the field and during practices, causes severe damage to delicate cell membranes in the brain. Be-cause of these repetitive traumas to the brain, retired NFL players between the ages of 30-49 are diagnosed with a dementia-related dysfunction at a rate 20 times higher than the general population. Dr. Amen points to his studies (which can be found at the links below) and believes that they show “significant evidence that football is one of the worst sports for the health of your brain.” Full Studies can be found on the web at:

Impact of Playing Professional Football on Long Term Brain Function http://neuro.psychiatryonline.org/article.aspx?Volume=23&page=98&journalID=62 Reversing Brain Damage in Former NFL Players: Implications for TBI and Substance

Abuse Rehabilitation http://www.ibh.com/Brain_Enhancement_Final_JPD_3_2011.pdf Elevated Body Mass in NFL Players Linked to Cognitive Impairment and Decreased

Prefrontal Cotex and Temporal Pole Activity http://www.nature.com/tp/journal/v2/n1/full/tp201167a.html Dr. Daniel Amen is a physician, psychiatrist, professor, and four time bestselling author. Dr. Amen is a Distin-guished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Assoc., and an Assistant Clinical Professor of Phychiatry and Human Behavior at the Univ. of California, Irvine School of Medicine. Dr. Amen is the lead researcher on the world’s largest brain imaging/rehabilitation study on professional football players. He is the founder of Amen Clinics, Inc. http://www.amenclinics.net/

Volume I , Issue 4

“This is for the players’ wives who haven’t discovered

the reason their husbands have

changed and why their family life is

so chaotic.” Mary Ann Easterling

Ray Easterling’s Widow to Keep Fighting for Retired NFL Players with Head Injuries

By: Mike Tierney

New York Times (Reprinted with permission)

RICHMOND, Va. — For Mary Ann Easterling, the prudent and less painful options, it might seem, are to move away and move on. Relocate from the home where she found the body of her husband, Ray, a handgun nearby, and the neighborhood where Ray, a former N.F.L. safety, would become disori-ented on long-distance jogs, sometimes prompting one-woman search parties at 2 a.m. Withdraw his name from the class-action lawsuit that accuses the league of improp-erly caring for retired players with head inju-ries, a consequence that she contends turned Ray’s last two decades into a living, foggy hell. Instead, Mary Ann, 59, plans to go nowhere. She won’t leave the brick ranch house on Traylor Drive, furnished with enough fond memories to overpower the unpleasant ones. Nor the legal campaign seeking en-hanced treatment and medical coverage for retired players. “This is for the players’ wives who haven’t discovered the reason their husbands have changed and why their family life is so cha-otic,” she said. Nine days after Ray’s death at 62, ruled a suicide by the police, his widow sat in the living room, recounting their ordeal for two and a half hours in a voice that was never choked by tears and occasionally rose an octave when reflecting mild indignation. This was four days before the former N.F.L. star Junior Seau died Wednesday in Califor-nia, a gunshot to the chest that the police ruled a suicide, reviving concerns about the possible long-term toll the sport has on its participants. To Mary Ann’s left, a floral arrangement brightened the fireplace. On a table within her reach was a stack of documents that detailed Ray’s relevant injuries and what she and her husband believed was a lack of sufficient attention to them. The documents

had been transcribed from his writing, or at least what she could decipher. His hands would shake, reducing his penmanship to barely legible scribbling. They met 37 years ago at a Thursday night Bible study co-hosted by Ray in someone’s basement — she a college senior majoring in music, he a “handsome, gregarious pro football player” with the Atlanta Falcons. Twelve whirlwind months later, bonding around their spirituality, they were wed de-spite this admonition from her choral direc-tor about commitment to an athlete: “Do you know what you are getting into?” Life as an athlete’s spouse turned out to be rather conventional, for the most part, filled by Bible study sessions with Ray’s team-mates and their wives, and free of extrava-gances. (His salary topped out at $75,000.) Eventually, the choral director’s warning began to resonate, though not as intended. Ray would arrive home woozy, complaining of brutal practices, equating games with combat. Retirement came reluctantly in 1979: he told her, after eight solid but un-spectacular seasons, that the body was unwilling to play more football, even if the mind was. No adverse aftereffects surfaced through the 1980s. Ray’s engaging personality, dis-cipline and diligence proved a good formula in the financial services field. What followed was a downward spiral during which he flipped to being argumentative and forget-ful, as if a personality transplant were mixed in with the two dozen orthopedic operations he endured. Business ventures slid off the rails when Ray, for whom punctuality was a practiced virtue, appeared tardy for appointments. In many settings, he would blurt out offen-sive remarks, the filter in his brain no longer functioning at full tilt. Realizing this, he be-came disengaged, even from his mother, who died a month before he did. At family events, he would show up in running shorts when more formal attire was appropriate.

(Continued on Page 4)

The Voice

(Continued from Page 3)

Staring into space wistfully, Mary Ann said, “I didn’t feel like I was with the person that I married.” The symptoms went unconnected to football by her and his doctors until late 2010. She was pinballing around the Internet. A report on a suicide led to the case studies of af-flicted ex-players. It was an a-ha moment. “Like reading my life story for the past 20 years,” she said. In three months, there came a diagnosis: dementia. Hallelujah, thought Mary Ann, even if the news was tantamount to a death sentence. Mystery solved. Ray’s decline continued unabated, with Mary Ann’s fear for his well-being increasing pro-portionally. The suicide of Dave Duerson last year hit close to home. Like Ray, Duerson played safety, and with a daredevil style. Ray had told Mary Ann that entering an institution for long-term care was unacceptable. Frustration over such fundamental activities as walking from one room to another, then not remembering why, was building. Still, Ray would set out on his runs, and not just neighborhood jogs, amid which he would often stumble and fall. Five days before the end, Mary Ann accompanied him to a track, where he knocked out sprints of 220 and 150 yards, asking in between if he was pump-ing his arms correctly. He had also taken to chopping up fallen trees in the area and collecting the logs. An acci-dent took off part of his thumb. On the morning of April 19, along with her husband’s lifeless body, Mary Ann discovered a note, written with his increasingly numb and quivering hands. It was addressed to her, sprinkled with “I love yous” and containing evidence that his faith had not wavered. Quoting from the letter, she said, “I’m ready to meet my Lord and sav-ior.” She acknowledged a sense of relief, and not just for herself after 20 years of exhaustive caregiving, although she never considered handing it off. In her mind’s eye, she can see Ray in heaven, suffering no more, his brain functioning normally. For now, Mary Ann intends to keep intact the self-described man cave, a two-room base-ment where Ray maintained an office and stored mementos. Hanging from the walls are photos, mostly black-and-white, of him lunging into a ball car-rier, often headfirst. There are annual team portraits, a few Ray Easterling football cards, his framed No. 32 jersey, a lightly padded helmet that was standard in his day and game balls, one of them ominously inscribed with the words, “Paid the Price.” One more remembrance sits outside, near the garage at the top of the driveway: stacks of logs, covered by a clear tarp, cut by Ray’s trembling hands. He had assured his wife that there would be enough wood to warm their house through the next few winters.

Ray Easterling’s Widow to Keep Fighting for Retired NFL Players with Head Injuries

“On the morning of April 19, along with

her husband’s lifeless body, Mary Ann

discovered a note, written with his

increasingly numb and quivering hands. It

was addressed to her, sprinkled with ‘I love yous’ and containing

evidence that his faith had not wavered. Quoting from the

letter, she said, ‘I’m ready to meet my Lord

and Savior.’

She acknowledged a sense of relief, and not just for herself after 20

years of exhaustive caregiving, although she never considered handing it off. In her mind’s eye, she can see

Ray in heaven, suffering no more, his

brain functioning normally.”

Mary Ann Easterling

Volume I , Issue 4

Veterans, Athletes and Brain Disease

By: Nicholas D. Kristof


He was a 27-year-old former Marine, struggling to adjust to civilian life after two tours in Iraq. Once an A student, he now found himself unable to remember conversations, dates and routine bits of daily life. He became irritable, snapped at his children and withdrew from his family. He and his wife began divorce proceedings. This young man took to alcohol, and a drunken car crash cost him his driver’s license. The De-partment of Veterans Affairs diagnosed him with post-traumatic stress disorder, or P.T.S.D. When his parents hadn’t heard from him in two days, they asked the police to check on him. The offi-cers found his body; he had hanged himself with a belt. That story is devastatingly common, but the au-topsy of this young man’s brain may have been historic. It revealed something startling that may shed light on the epidemic of suicides and other troubles experienced by veterans of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. His brain had been physically changed by a dis-ease called chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or C.T.E. That’s a degenerative condition best-known for affecting boxers, football players and other athletes who endure repeated blows to the head. In people with C.T.E., an abnormal form of a pro-tein accumulates and eventually destroys cells throughout the brain, including the frontal and temporal lobes. Those are areas that regulate impulse control, judgment, multitasking, memory and emotions. That Marine was the first Iraq veteran found to have C.T.E., but experts have since autopsied a dozen or more other veterans’ brains and have repeatedly found C.T.E. The findings raise a criti-cal question: Could blasts from bombs or gre-nades have a catastrophic impact similar to those of repeated concussions in sports, and could the rash of suicides among young veterans be a result? ““P.T.S.D. in a high-risk cohort like war veterans could actually be a physical disease from perma-nent brain damage, not a psychological dis-ease,” said Bennet Omalu, the neuropathologist who examined the veteran. Dr. Omalu published an article about the 27-year-old veteran as a sentinel case in Neurosurgical Focus, a peer-reviewed medical journal. The discovery of C.T.E. in veterans could be stun-ningly important. Sadly, it could also suggest that the worst is yet to come, for C.T.E. typically devel-ops in midlife, decades after exposure. If we are

seeing C.T.E. now in war veterans, we may see much more in the coming years. So far, just this one case of a veteran with C.T.E. has been published in a peer-reviewed medical journal. But at least three groups of scientists are now conducting brain autopsies on veterans, and they have found C.T.E. again and again, experts tell me. Publication of this research is in the works. The finding of C.T.E. may help answer a puzzle. Returning Vietnam veterans did not have sharply elevated suicide rates as Iraq and Afghan veter-ans do today. One obvious difference is that Afghan and Iraq veterans are much more likely to have been exposed to blasts, whose shock waves send the brain crashing into the skull. “Imagine a squishy, gelatinous material, sur-rounded by fluid, and then surrounded by a hard skull,” explained Robert A. Stern, a C.T.E. expert at Boston University School of Medicine. “The brain is going to move, jiggle around inside the skull. A helmet cannot do anything about that.” Dr. Stern emphasized that the study of C.T.E. is still in its infancy. But he said that his hunch is that C.T.E. accounts for a share — he has no idea how large — of veteran suicides. C.T.E. leads to a degenerative loss of memory and thinking ability and, eventually, to dementia. There is also often a pattern of depression, impulsiveness and, all too often, suicide. There is now no treatment, or even a way of diagnosing C.T.E. other than exam-ining the brain after death. While the sports industry has lagged in respond-ing to the discovery of C.T.E., and still does not adequately protect athletes from repeated con-cussions, the military has been far more proac-tive. The Defense Department has formed its own unit to autopsy brains and study whether blasts may be causing C.T.E. Frankly, I was hesitant to write this column. Some veterans and their families are at wit’s end. If the problem in some cases is a degenera-tive physical ailment, currently incurable and fated to get worse, do they want to know? I called Cheryl DeBow, a mother I wrote about recently. She sent two strong, healthy sons to Iraq. One committed suicide, and the other is struggling. DeBow said that it would actually be comforting to know that there might be an un-derlying physical ailment, even if it is progres-sive. “You’re dealing with a ghost when it’s P.T.S.D.,” she told me a couple of days ago. “Everything changes when it’s something physical. People are more understanding. It’s a relief to the veter-ans and to the family. And, anyway, we want to know.”

“He was a 27-year-old former Marine, struggling to adjust to civilian life after two tours in Iraq. Once an A student, he now found himself unable to remember conversations, dates and routine bits of daily life. He became irritable, snapped at his children and withdrew from his family. He and his wife began divorce proceedings. This young man took to alcohol, and a drunken car crash cost him his driver’s license. The Department of Veterans Affairs diagnosed him with post-traumatic stress disorder, or P.T.S.D. When his parents hadn’t heard from him in two days, they asked the police to check on him. The officers found his body; he had hanged himself with a belt”

Autopsy revealed: CTE

Volume I , Issue 4

Brain Ailments in Veterans And Athletes

By: James Dao


Scientists who have studied a degenerative brain disease in athletes have found the same condition in combat veterans exposed to road-side bombs in Iraq and Afghanistan, conclud-ing that such explosions injure the brain in ways strikingly similar to tackles and punches.

The researchers also discovered what they believe is the mechanism by which explosions damage brain tissue and trigger the wasting disease, called chronic traumatic encephalopa-thy, or C.T.E., by studying simulated explo-sions on mice. The animals developed evi-dence of the disease just two weeks after expo-sure to a single simulated blast, researchers found.

“Our paper points out in a profound and de-finitive way that there is an organic, structural problem in the brain associated with blast exposure,” said Dr. Lee E. Goldstein of Boston University’s School of Medicine and a lead author of the paper, which was published online Wednesday by the peer-reviewed jour-nal Science Translational Medicine.

The paper provides the strongest evidence yet that some and perhaps many combat veterans with invisible brain injuries caused by explo-sions are at risk of developing long-term neu-rological disease — a finding that, if con-firmed, would have profound implications for military policy, veterans programs and future research.

The study could provide a starting point for developing preventive measures for blast-related brain injuries, as well as drug therapies and diagnostic tests for C.T.E., an incurable disease detected only by autopsy.

“The animal model developed by the research-ers will enable a better understanding of the brain pathology involved in blast injuries and, ideally, lead to new therapies to help service members and veterans with traumatic brain injuries,” said Dr. Joel Kupersmith, the chief research and development officer for the De-partment of Veterans Affairs, which helped finance the research.

The paper also seems likely to fuel a debate that has raged for decades over whether veter-ans who struggle emotionally and psychologi-cally after returning from war suffer from psy-chiatric problems or brain injuries.

Dr. Goldstein and his co-lead author, Dr. Ann McKee, co-director of the Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy at Boston Uni-versity, assert that their paper shows that

many of those veterans probably have organic brain injuries and should be given appropriate treatment and disability compensation.

“Not long ago, people said N.F.L. players with behavior problems were just having problems adjusting to retirement,” Dr. Goldstein said. “Now it’s more or less settled that there is a disease associated with their problems. But we do not have that consensus in the military world yet.”

Since 2001, the military has confirmed trau-matic brain injury — widely considered the precursor to C.T.E. — in more than 220,000 of the 2.3 million troops who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan, though some experts believe the actual number is higher. There is no way yet of estimating how many of those combat veterans may develop the disease.

Some experts who have read the paper ques-tioned the authors’ conclusions, saying that there was not enough data to conclude that blast exposure leads to C.T.E. Dr. McKee au-topsied only four veterans, and three of them had head injuries from multiple sources, mak-ing it hard to determine the cause of the dis-ease, they said.

“It’s too small of a sample size,” said Dr. David Hovda, director of the Brain Injury Research Center at the University of California, Los An-geles, and a health adviser to the Pentagon.

But Dr. Hovda said that the growing body of research linking C.T.E. to multiple head inju-ries was “quite remarkable.”

Dr. Daniel P. Perl, professor of pathology at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, the military’s medical school, said the study did not convince him that the injuries from blast exposure were identical to head injuries from sports, and he questioned whether data from the mouse research was applicable to humans. But Dr. Perl, who has just started his own project to study the brains of military personnel, called the paper “an important contribution.”

While acknowledging some issues in using mice, Dr. McKee said that animal tests helped resolve a problem scientists face in studying C.T.E.: human patients typically suffer concus-sions in several ways, whether from car acci-dents, sports or combat.

(Continued on page 7)

“Scientists who have studied a degenerative

brain disease in athletes have found

the same condition in combat veterans

exposed to roadside bombs in Iraq and

Afghanistan, concluding that such explosions injure the

brain in ways strikingly similar to tackles and

punches.”

The Voice

(Continued from page 6)

With mice, the researchers could ensure that the brain damage was caused solely by blast exposure.

C.T.E. causes neurological decay and is linked to memory loss, personality changes, impaired judg-ment, depression and dementia. A once obscure disorder thought mainly to afflict boxers, it has entered the popular lexicon in recent years as more athletes have received the diagnosis, including David Duer-son, the former All-Pro defensive back for the Chicago Bears, who killed himself last year.

The new study out of Boston is just the second time scientists have found C.T.E. in combat veterans. Last fall, a team of researchers led by Dr. Bennet Omalu discovered evidence of the disease in a 27-year-old Iraq war veteran who committed suicide in 2010. The former Marine had reported being close to mortar blasts and roadside bombs in Iraq, but also experienced multiple concussions from contact sports.

Dr. Omalu, the chief medical examiner for San Joaquin County, Calif., said he was preparing another paper documenting C.T.E. in eight veterans who had received diagnoses of post-traumatic stress disor-der before they died.

Dr. McKee, who directs a brain donation center at the Department of Veterans Affairs medical center in Bedford, Mass., said it took her four years to gain access to the brains of the four veterans. Three of the veterans had single or multiple exposures to blasts, while a fourth had multiple concussions from foot-ball and vehicle accidents.

She compared tissue samples from those veterans with the brains of four athletes — three amateur foot-ball players and a professional wrestler — three of whom reported multiple concussions and all of whom died in their teens or 20s. She also studied the brains of four people with no record of concus-sions.

In all the veterans and athletes, Dr. McKee found the signature evidence of early phase C.T.E.: dead or dying neurons, abnormal clumps of a toxic protein and damaged axons, the fibers that transmit signals between nerve cells. She found no evidence of the disease in the people with no reported concussions.

For the animal part of the study, Dr. Goldstein developed a 27-foot-long “shock tube” to simulate explo-sions. At one end of the aluminum tube the researchers attached a device that uses compressed nitro-gen to explode a Mylar membrane, generating force equal to the explosion of a 120-millimeter mortar round. At the other end, they tied down mice, allowing their heads to move freely.

The researchers found that shock waves from the blast moving at more than 1,000 miles per hour had no perceptible effect on brain tissue. But the subsequent blast wind, traveling at 330 m.p.h., shook the skull violently in what the researchers called “bobblehead effect.”

When the scientists examined specially stained tissue from the mouse brains under microscopes just two weeks later, they found the telltale signs of C.T.E.

The scientists also found that mice exposed to blasts showed short-term memory loss and declines in learning capacity just a few weeks later.

But when the researchers immobilized mouse heads during blasts, the mice did not develop learning problems later, suggesting that the brain trauma might be blocked by preventing the head from snap-ping around during an explosion.

Dr. Hovda said that one implication of the study might be that “traumatic brain injury is not an event that we recover from.”

“Maybe it is the beginning of a series of events that we have to deal with for years,” he said.

As devastating as that news may seem, it may also provide comfort to some military families.

Jennifer Smith, the widow of Michael Smith, the Marine found to have C.T.E. by Dr. Omalu, said she had gained a better understanding of his suicide after researchers told her his emotional problems might have been the result of a brain injury.

In an interview, Ms. Smith said that after her husband returned from his second tour of Iraq in 2009, he had nightmares and mood swings and seemed angry much of the time. (He also had a concussion from playing football in that period.)

Before he hanged himself in 2010, doctors gave him a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder and put him on antidepressant drugs, to no avail, she said.

Brain Ailments in Veterans And Athletes

“The growing body of research linking CTE to multiple head injuries [is]

quite remarkable”

Dr. David Hovda

The Voice

“As Executive Director, my number

one priority is to protect those who

play and have played this game.

There is no interest greater than their health and safety”

DeMaurice Smith, Executive Director of the NFLPA

Testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives,

Oct. 28, 2009

DeMaurice Smith - What He Knew and When He Knew It

By: Jim Mitchell

Beginning in October 2009 and continuing in January 2010, the United States

House of Representatives, Committee on the Judiciary held hearings to look into the Legal Issues Relating to Football and Head Injuries. During those Hearings, NFLPA Executive Director DeMaurice Smith testified that he hoped the Hearings would, “be a turning point on this issue”, adding that, “as Executive Director, my number one priority is to protect those who play and have played the game. There is no interest greater than their health and safety.” Smith acknowledged however that when it came to the concussion issue, “the Players Union in the past has not done its best”, that it was “complicit” in their “accountability” on this issue and that traumatic brain injuries represented some of the most severe injuries known to affect football players. Furthermore, Smith admitted that, “the long-lasting effects of these injuries can be devastating.”

Speaking to the retired NFL players in attendance at the Hearing, Smith informed

them that “medical care is not and will never be a Collective Bargaining issue” and that for “too long”, former players were “left adrift”. Smith pledged, “[t]o men like John Mackey, to men like Brent Boyd, to men like Mr. Wood, and to the families of Mr. Mike Webster and to Andre Waters, and to those organizations like Gridiron Greats that stand with us, I commit and we commit this as our primary mission. We will not fail them. I will not fail them.”

Smith said that the NFL for years had “denigrated” or “ignored” studies demon-strating the connection between playing professional football and cognitive impairments, and “moved slowly in an area where speed should have been the impetus.” Smith went on to pledge that, such days of wrongly rejecting justified medical findings “must come to an end.” Moving forward, he said, the NFLPA would, “objectively and honestly embrace all of the studies and evidence so that we can craft a roadmap that leads to preventative measures.” Smith also committed to improving the coverage provided by the 88 Plan, which only included dementia. He explained that the Union “should look to expand [88 Plan] coverage to a wider array of mental and psychologically debilitating conditions such as traumatic brain injury, severe depression and other neurological diseases.” Smith declared that, “on behalf of those who play and those who played this game, we are committed to getting the right answers, to work with everyone who has the goal of protecting our players, and serve as a model for football at every level.” Smith also recognized that “the National Football League and the players in this game owe an obliga-tion not only to those who have played this game, but to those who will play this game in the future.” See Full Version of Congressional Hearing on Legal Issues Relating to Football Head Injuries (parts I & II):

http://judiciary.house.gov/hearings/hear_100104.html

Jim Mitchell is a Paralegal with Hausfeld LLP

“I commit and we commit to this as

our mission. We will not fail them.”

DeMaurice Smith, Executive Director of the NFLPA

Testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives,

Oct. 28, 2009

Volume I , Issue 4

Concussions and Recent Retirements

By: Jim Mitchell

After going undrafted in the 2012 NFL Draft, former Ohio State linebacker Andrew Sweat signed a free-agent contract with the Cleveland Browns. Obviously excited at the prospect of playing in the NFL, Sweat Tweeted the news on Twitter on April 28th.

Then on Friday, May 11th, as Sweat prepared for his first training camp, he made the decision that his health was more important than a career in the NFL. Having suffered 3 concussions as a member of the Ohio State football team, and already reportedly feeling some of the after affects such as bouts of depression, Sweat decided to retire from football. On May 14th, Sweat Tweeted his decision saying that, “health trumps football any day”, and thanked the Browns for the opportunity.

Sweat’s former teammate and friend at Ohio State, linebacker Ross Homan, also made the decision to retire from football. Homan was a sixth-round pick of the Minnesota Vikings in the 2011 Draft. During a pre-season game in September 2011, Homan suffered a concussion that made him second guess his decision to pursue a career in the NFL. Homan had also suffered concussions while a member of the Ohio State football team and did not want to risk further brain injury in the NFL. On May 8, 2012, Rams offensive guard Jacob Bell surprised everyone when he announced his retire-ment at age 31, after 8 years in the League, over concerns he has about the long term effects of repeated head trauma. Bell said he thought about retiring from football last year, however the death of Junior Seau was the “cherry on top.” On October 23, 2011, San Diego Chargers left guard Kris Dielman suffered an on field concussion during a game against the New York Jets, in New York. Despite Dielman’s wobbly appearance and obvious disorientation at that time, he was left in the game and continued playing. At the time, CBS announcer Jim Nantz commented that Dielman was “a little shaky and wobbly.” On the team flight home to San Diego after the game, Dielman suffered a grand mal seizure, which doctors later attributed to the on field concussion Dielman suffered earlier in the day. On March 1, 2012, Dielman announced his retirement from football after 9 sea-sons, 4 of which sent him to the Pro Bowl, because of concussion fears related to the October 23rd incident.


“Health trumps football any day”

Andrew Sweat Tweet on May 14,

2012

Volume I , Issue 4

“Because of the emerging evidence that participation in football causes permanent brain

damage, leading to depression and early

dementia, the prospect of future medical care

for life becomes invaluable.”

NFL ATTACKS CALIFORNIA WORKERS’ COMPENSATION SYSTEM

BY: Ron Mix, Attorney, former NFL player & Member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame

All employers in the United States are compelled to provide workers’ compensation insurance for all employees. The benefits ad-dress many of the problems that befell retired players by providing cash awards, future medical care, and possible life pensions. Because of the emerging evidence that participation in football causes permanent brain damage, leading to depression and early dementia, the prospect of future medical care for life becomes invaluable. Over the past few years, the NFL and its teams have unleashed millions of dollars, employing attorneys and lobbyists to limit access to the California workers’ compensation courts because, often, California is the only state where players can successfully file claims. The reasons that California has been the state of last resort for thousands of former players are as follows: (1) all states have a time period in which claims must be filed or the rights are lost (the statute of limitations); that time period is usually one year whether a player was aware of his rights or not; however, California places the burden on the employer to inform the injured worker of his rights; in this instance, if the team did not inform the player of his rights and the player was not otherwise aware of his rights, the statute is sus-pended until the player finds out about his rights, even if the player does not find out until many years after he retires; (2) the vast majority of an athlete’s problems are the result of cumulative trauma (wear and tear over the entire career). Not all states provide benefits for cumulative trauma; instead, they provide benefits for only specific injury incidents that lead to permanent disability. The right to recover for cumulative trauma is again made particularly important with the emerging evidence of brain damage. A few diagnosed concussions are not the main culprit in brain damage cases—it is the 100’s of undiag-nosed concussions that result from the 1000’s of blows to the head most players take over their careers. Every time you were hit hard enough to see stars, to be stunned, that was a low-grade concussion. The beauty of future medical care pro-vided by workers’ compensation is that there is no deductible and no dollar limit on coverage, unlike a regular health insurance policy.

The NFL and its member teams are attacking California’s right to have jurisdiction over out-of-state employers and the threat is real enough that retired players are advised to consult with their personal attorneys to determine if they still have a viable claim in their home state or if it is barred by the statute of limitations or if their state does not permit recovery for disabilities caused by cumulative trauma. If you do not have a viable claim in your home state, you should contact a California attorney as soon as possible to explore filing a claim in California. The NFL and its member teams are attacking the system on several different fronts: (1) approximately 6 to 8 of the teams began inserting a contract provision that purported to require the player to only file for workers’ com-pensation in the state where the team was lo-cated; currently, there are several cases on this issue working their way through the appellate courts; (2) some states have reciprocal agree-ments with California whereby each state agrees that temporary employees will be limited to filing claims only in the state where the employer’s business (read: team) is located; (3) all standard player contracts have a general choice of law provision and some teams are asserting this general dispute resolution provision is also appli-cable to workers’ compensation (no way the teams will prevail on this issue). The National Football League Players Association has been extremely generous in fighting the NFL and member teams on these issues and have hired outstanding national liti-gation firms to defend the retired players. Those of us involved in these cases believe that we have a legal basis to defend the right to continue to file in California. Most recently, primarily through the legal efforts of attorneys hired by the NFLPA, we defeated the effort by the Miami Dol-phins to restrict Dolphin players to only filing claims in Florida…but that was a two-year battle. The point is: don’t wait. There is no guarantee that the NFL will not make some in-roads in limiting California’s right to have juris-diction over workers’ compensation cases involv-ing out-of-state employers. I would elaborate on the dangers but this article is certain to be read by NFL personnel and I do not wish to provide a roadmap to them of the dangers I perceive.

(Continued on Page 11)

Volume I , Issue 4


SUMMARY OF WORKERS’ COMPENSATION BENEFITS & PROCEDURE The purpose of this Summary is to provide a very brief review of the laws that exist to protect athletes and other injured workers. My references are generally to benefits available under California law because it is very likely that athletes and coaches may be able to apply for benefits in this State.

What Is Workers’ Compensation? Workers’ Compensation was designed to provide cash and health care benefits for injured workers. Professional athletes are covered. The teams provide benefits by purchasing workers’ compensation insurance. Once the claim is filed, it is processed against the insurance company not the team unless the team is permissibly self-insured (very few teams are in this later category).

Cash Awards For Permanent Disability. Compensation is awarded for specific injuries and for cumulative injuries (those that occur from wear and tear over the player’s entire career, also called “cumulative trauma”). The benefits vary and de-pend on the degree of disability to the athlete or coach and the time period when he or she were employed. The amount of recovery may also be impacted by a relatively recent change in California law, effective January 1, 2005. In California, it would not be unusual for a player who retired during the period of 1994 to the present time to receive a tax-free award within the range of $100,000.00 to $150,000.00. A player who played during earlier periods would likely receive less. These are just common ranges and an individual case could result in recoveries smaller or larger than the cited examples. I have represented athletes and coaches who have received settlements or court awards that are both lower than that range and higher than that range.

Lifetime Medical Care. Players and coaches are entitled to receive future medical care for the rest of their lives for work-related problems. Insurance companies will generally offer extra money in an attempt to get the worker to waive his/her right to future medical care. Candidly, most players accept the extra money and waive their rights to future medical care. Sometimes it is wise to do so; sometimes it is not wise.

Life Pensions. Players and coaches who are rated 70% or more disabled qualify for a pension the rest of their lives. The pensions are mostly modest and generally fall within the range of $4,000.00 to $7,500.00 a year. Most professionals who file claims have disability ratings within the range of 50% to 90%. Dis-ability ranges can be lower for claims where the professional has concluded his or her career on or after January 1, 2005 because the method used to calculate disability changed effective January 1, 2005.

Will The Athlete or Coach Qualify For Benefits? Every injured professional is eligible to apply. I have not met any professional who has not left his or her sport in worse condition than when he or she began and does not experience some level of joint pain and restrictions in work capacity.

What If The Athlete or Coach Has Been Retired A Long Time? If the team or teams had not informed the professional of his or her rights to workers’ compensation benefits and the professional was not otherwise aware of his or her rights to file a claim in California, it is likely that the professional can still file a claim in California. This exception is not available in most other states. Can The Athlete or Coach File the Claim In California No Matter Where the Professional was Em-ployed? That is very likely under the current law which holds that a person who is regularly employed in Cali-fornia may file a claim in California. The courts have held that “regular employment” includes an ath-lete playing for an out-of-state team coming into California to play games. I have processed many claims for athletes who have played their entire careers for teams outside the state of California.



“The purpose of this Summary is to provide a very brief review of the laws

that exist to protect athletes and other injured workers.”

Ron Mix

The Voice


Is Workers’ Compensation Available in All States?

Yes, it is to one degree or another. Benefits vary from state to state.

Cost Of Filing A Claim. Nothing. Workers’ Compensation claims are processed by attorneys who work under a contin-gency agreement, which means there is no charge unless there is a recovery. Disability evaluations are arranged, complete with x-rays and MRI’s, at no cost to the clients. In California, the current allowed attorney fee is 15% to 18% of the recovery. In most other states, the attorney’s fees are in the 25% to 30% range.

I will be most happy to discuss any individual case at no cost to the athlete.

Ronald J. Mix

Law Offices of Ron Mix

409 Camino del Rio South, Suite 101

San Diego, California 92108

(619) 688-9630


Ron Mix Biography Attended the University of Southern California. Twelve years of professional football as offensive lineman (San Diego Chargers: 10 years; Oakland Raiders: 2 years). Inducted into Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1979. Past President of Hall of Fame Players Associa-tion. Active on various levels in attempting to obtain increase in retirement benefits for former professional football players. Has national attorney rating of AV, which is the highest rating an attorney can obtain for skill and integrity.

“Is Workers’ Compensation Available in All

States? Yes, it is to one

degree or another. Benefits vary from

state to state.”

The Voice

Gridiron Greats Announce an Expansion of Programs to Help NFL Retired Players

The Gridiron Greats Assistance Fund (GGAF) is pleased to announce that they have secured the necessary commitments and resources to expand their assistance programs to retired players in need. Beginning the summer of 2012, the GGAF will release details concerning expansions to some of its existing programs, as well as announcements regarding the launch of new programs. Some of the exciting new programs GGAF will be launching this summer include, pro bono dental and eye care programs to be kicked off in 5 States. Also the GGAF is thrilled to be intro-ducing the Gridiron Greats Brothers for Life program, a peer-to-peer program where retired play-ers can freely speak to other retired players in a safe comfortable environment, without fear of outside pressures. The peer-to-peer program will offer retirees the ability to communicate with others who have either gone through similar life situations, or are currently experiencing a similar issue. Lastly, the GGAF is excited to announce the implementation of its Greats Guardian Angel program. The Guardian Angel program will focus on the wives and widows of former NFL players, as well as the families and caregivers. The Guardian Angel program, like the Brothers for Life program, will provide a safe, secure and non-judgmental place to share experiences, issues, solu-tions and support with the families of other former players. The program will help families learn coping mechanisms, will provide necessary tools needed to help families tackle the issues of an NFL retirement, and will help direct families to the proper resources. The GGAF is also pleased to be offering expanded programs for medical care, and will provide additional pro bono health care for former players who do not have insurance. Commitments have been secured to allow for an expansion of the medical care facilities that will provide pro bono care to retired players without insurance.

Gridiron Greats Assistance Fund Honors NFL Legends - May 18, 2012

The Gridiron Greats Assistance Fund held its fourth annual Hall of Fame Induction Dinner on May 18, 2012, in Novi, Michigan, to honor 11 players for their both their outstanding perform-ances on the field as well as for their charitable contributions off the field. The GGAF honored the careers of NFL greats Joe DeLamielleure, Dan Dierdorf, Marv Levy, Bobby Bell, Angelo Mosca, Billy Sims, Gary Moeller, Al “Bubba” Baker, Arch Matsos, Hank Bullough, and Kyle Turley. Also honored was current Detroit Lions Tight End Tony Scheffler, who received the Ron Kramer Award. Two other awards of appreciation were given to Tim Pendell (Lions’ retired Director of Community Affairs), and former Lions Coach Rick Forzano in appreciation for giving back to their community. GGAF Chairman Mike Ditka indicated that the Hall of Fame induction “is a great way for us to honor deserving individuals not just because they were great players, but because they have given so much back to the community.”

The Gridiron Greats has formed a multi-million dollar medical program which is a humanitarian initiative intended to provide a wide variety of medical treatments to retired NFL players with little or no means to pay for medical care. Players who qualify will not incur any costs for evaluations, medical procedures or rehabilitation they may receive.

This program is made possible by the generosity of multiple facilities with world-class specialists. The following facilities are offering pro bono services: OAA Orthopaedic Specialists located in Allen-town, Pennsylvania, All Star Orthopaedics in Dallas, Texas, Coastal Orthopaedics in New Port Richey, Florida, Laser Spine Institute in Tampa, Florida, Midwest Orthopaedics at Rush in Chicago, Illinois, Illinois Back Institute in Chicago, Illinois, Carolinas Rehabilitation in Charlotte, North Caro-lina, and Premier Sports Medicine in Melbourne, Florida.

If you are a player in need of assistance or a medical facility who wants to apply to our medical program please contact us at (847) 509-3086 or on the internet at: http://www.gridirongreats.org

“The Gridiron Greats has formed a multi-

million dollar medical program which is a

humanitarian initiative intended to provide a

wide variety of medical treatments to

retired NFL players with little or no means

to pay for medical care. Players who

qualify will not incur any costs for

evaluations, medical procedures or

rehabilitation they may receive.”

GGAF

The Voice

“The owners decided last week

that their talks with the union on this

issue had been stalled long enough so clubs will fund

their share now and welcome a decision

by DeMaurice Smith and the NFLPA to fund the remaining

49% as soon as possible.”

(The following message was circulated to retired NFL players by Joe Browne, Senior Advisor to the Commissioner on June 1, 2012)

NFL clubs last week at a League meeting in Atlanta decided to fund 51 percent of the cost of providing Legacy benefits to approximately 320 widows and other sur-vivors of eligible pre-1993 players. This benefit will be retroactive to August 4, 2011, which was the same effective date for the Legacy benefit for eligible pre-93 players. The widows will receive 51% on the same basis that they received their late husband’s benefit under the Bell-Rozelle Pension Plan. Widows of eligible pre-93 players who remarried after their player-husband’s death still are eligible for the benefit. Why only 51% for the survivors? That is the same percentage that the clubs already are paying the 2,300 pre-93 players under the Legacy benefit program. Unfortunately, what is NOT the same is that the clubs have not yet reached agree-ment with the NFLPA on its share of this survivor benefit. The owners decided last week that their talks with the union on this issue had been stalled long enough so clubs will fund their share now and welcome a decision by DeMaurice Smith and the NFLPA to fund the remaining 49 % as soon as possible. The union also evidently has questioned the source of the clubs’ payment for the widows and has indicated that player fine money should not be used for this pur-pose. Over the last 8 years, player fine money has been used to provide funding in the name of the League and NFLPA for Asian earthquake and tsunami relief, Hurricane Katrina relief and other natural disasters. Certainly, if the decision is made to use player fine resources to pay the widows of many individuals who helped build the league, that would be an appropriate use of the money. The League earlier had proposed to the NFLPA that this same player fine money be used to fund the joint Player Care Foundation in future years but the union has remained non-committal to that proposal as well. Whatever decision is made about how player fine money is used, the clubs will pay their share of the legacy benefit for widows and other survivors.

NFL OWNERS TO PAY 51% OF LEGACY BENEFITS TO WIDOWS AND OTHER SURVIVORS OF

ELIGIBLE PRE-1993 PLAYERS

The Voice

NFLPA WI D OW S PE T I T I O N

The Voice

By: Jim Mitchell

On February 4, 2010, the NFLPA held a press conference at the Super Bowl in Miami, Florida. During this event, NFLPA Executive Director DeMaurice Smith acknowledged that, “when it comes to benefits for pre-1993 play-ers, the current system is not working.” Smith also stated that it would be an “immoral deci-sion” for today’s players not to acknowledge the players who came before them. Likewise, NFL ownership indicated in an April 4, 2011 letter to retirees that, “[w]e are committed to making sure that when we do reach a new agreement it better addresses the needs of our retirees. It’s the fair thing to do. It’s the right thing to do and it recognizes and respects [retirees] contributions to the game.” On March 11, 2011, the NFLPA walked away from the bargaining table, leaving behind an offer from the League that would have pro-vided substantial increases to retiree benefits. The NFLPA then relinquished its status as a labor organization and filed suit against the NFL on behalf of a class of current players, free agents, and rookies. The suit became known as the Brady suit and did not include the retired players interests.

Eller I On March 28, 2011, four retired NFL play-ers joined Hall of Fame defensive end Carl Eller and filed a class action suit in federal district court in Minnesota against the NFL and its 32 member clubs. (Eller v. NFL – Case No. 11cv648) Eller I sought to cover the void left when the Brady suit chose not to include the interests and rights of retired players. Eller I sought to protect the rights of retirees in any future negotiations with the NFL on a new CBA. Through Eller I, the retirees for the first time had their own voice and were able to speak for themselves in order to demand increases to their pensions, health benefits, medical bene-fits, and changes to the disability programs which up to this point had not met the needs and rights of the retirees. Additionally, Eller I was necessary because if the owner lockout was successful, and the 2011 season was shutdown, there would not have been suffi-cient new revenue for the League to meet its monetary commitments to the retiree commu-nity. When the lockout ended, the claims in Eller

NFL Retiree Litigation

I were mooted and the retiree class voluntar-ily withdrew the Complaint without prejudice.

Eller II For a most of the spring and summer of 2011, without right, consent or authority, the representatives of the Brady plaintiffs negoti-ated the interests of retired players. Retirees were kept in the dark as to secret meetings held in Chicago, New York, Baltimore, and Washington, DC. When an agreement be-tween the players and the owners was reached, improvements to and increases in retiree benefits were sacrificed in favor of the interest of active players. On September 13, 2011, 28 former play-ers, including 25 Hall of Famers, filed a class action suit on behalf of former NFL players in federal district court in Minnesota against the NFLPA, NFLPA Executive Director DeMau-rice Smith, and NFL players Tom Brady, and Mike Vrabel. (Eller v. NFLPA – Case No. 11cv2623) The suit seeks damages for those improvements and increases to retiree benefits that were sacrificed by the Brady plaintiffs and representatives during negotia-tions. The suit also seeks to establish an independent organization to represent retiree rights, other than the Union. Eller II contends that the defendants could not legally compro-mise the rights of retirees for the benefit of active players and that retiree rights should never again be jeopardized by an organiza-tion that has a history of antagonism towards retirees and outright conflict of interest.

Gault On October 13, 2011, former Super Bowl Champion and Chicago Bears great Willie Gault and 18 other former players – includ-ing non-vested, vested, and Hall of Famer players alike, joined Carl Eller when they filed a class action suit on behalf of former NFL players against the NFLPA in federal district court in Minnesota. (Gault v. NFLPA – Case No. 11cv3012) The Gault case was consoli-dated with Eller II, on December 16, 2011, and the combined Eller II action now includes 47 former players, 27 of whom are Hall of Famers, 26 of whom are listed in the NFL’s official encyclopedia, Total Football II, as among 300 of the greatest players in NFL history. Combined, the Plaintiffs in the Eller II suit have made 39 Super Bowl appearances, have been selected to a combined 201 Pro Bowls, and represent every decade of pro


“The Court recognizes and

acknowledges the plight of the

retired players and is empathetic to their concerns”

Judge Susan Nelson in her decision to grant the Union’s

Motion to Dismiss

A. Eller I , Eller II and Gault

The Voice



football since the 1940s.

Consolidated Eller II

On May 29, 2012, Judge Susan Nelson granted the NFLPA’s Motion to Dismiss the Eller II Complaint. In her decision, Judge Nelson recognized and acknowledged the plight of retired play-ers and indicated that she was empathetic to their concerns. Despite that recognition and ac-knowledgement, she held that the decertified Union (Defendants), “[I]n seeking a new contract with the League, [were] under no obligation to, in effect, “harm” themselves in order to avoid “harming” Plaintiffs [retired players], by taking a smaller share of the pie for themselves in order to give Plaintiffs [retired players] a larger share of that pie.” She went on to say, “Defendants had the right to pursue the best possible deal for themselves and, if the terms of any particular deal they obtained necessarily resulted in benefits for Plaintiffs that they now allege are less ad-vantageous to the retired players than what Plaintiffs hoped for or expected, the resulting differ-ence between what the Plaintiffs “expected” and what they in fact received cannot be the basis for a tortuous interference claim here.” Later in her opinion, Judge Nelson wrote, “ Some disjunction between the interests of the ac-tive and the retired players appears inevitable in light of the fact that the players’ collective bar-gaining unit excludes, by definition, the retired players.” Judge Nelson continued, “Not surpris-ingly, ‘the NFLPA has consistently favored the interests of active NFL players at the expense of NFL retirees’ rights and benefits’” The Court also stated that although newly elected NFLPA Executive Director DeMaurice Smith stated that, “the Union has a fiduciary duty to retired players…”, that, “as a matter of law”, Smith’s statement “did not operate to assume any legally enforceable fiduciary duty towards the retired players.” The Court went on to say that, “no retired player could reasonably understand Smith’s statement to have assumed a fiduciary duty towards the retired players and, likewise, Smith, although an attorney, could not have reasonably intended his statement to have assumed such a fiduciary duty.” The Eller II Complaint can be found at:

http://www.hausfeldllp.com/content_documents/9/EllerIIComplaintwithExhibits.pdf

Judge Nelson’s Order Granting Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss can be found at:

http://www.hausfeldllp.com/pages/current_investigations/486/nfl


“Not surprisingly, ‘the NFLPA has

consistently favored the

interests of active NFL players at the expense of NFL

retirees’ rights and benefits’”

Judge Susan Nelson in her decision to grant the Union’s

Motion to Dismiss

A. Eller I , Eller II and Gault

The Voice

Per the Case Management Order No. 2, issued on by Judge Brody in the MDL on April 26, 2012, the following schedule will dictate the timetable and track that the personal injury concussion litigation will follow. If changes are made to any of the dates and deadlines listed on the schedule below, an up-dated version will appear in the next issue of The Voice.

B. Concussions Litigation - In Re: NFL Players’

Concussion Injury Litigation (MDL)


The Voice

Retirees “seek nothing

more than to obtain their

fair share of the revenues

the NFL has earned,

and will earn, by the use

of the retired players’

identities”

-Dryer Complaint

By: Swathi Bojedla In Dryer v. NFL, 0:09-cv-02182 (D. Minn.), a group of retired football players (led by Fred Dryer, Jim Marshall, Elvin Bethea, Joe Senser, Dan Pastorini, and Ed White) allege the NFL, primarily through its NFL Films division, has used retired players’ likenesses with-out permission in order promote the league and earn substantial revenues. The complaint focuses on the fact that the NFL uses extensive film productions to pro-mote the league - complete with scripts, music and editing as opposed to re-broadcasts of NFL games - for which it has generally offered no compensation to retired players whose images are used throughout these films. These retired players, particularly those from the “glory days” prior to 1993, are used to create a mythology of the NFL, and to advertise and promote the game today. The retired players have brought claims for unjust enrich-ment, violations of the Lanham Act, and for violations of their rights of publicity due to these unauthorized uses of their likenesses. The complaint alleges that while the league was allowed to use players’ names, im-ages, and likenesses during their playing days, no such usage was allowed after the play-ers’ contracts expired. The new CBA, effective August 4, 2011, helps support that view of retired player publicity rights in that it addressed player publicity rights AFTER an individ-ual player contracts end. For the first time, the CBA’s standard NFL Player Contract in-cludes language giving the NFL the "right and authority" to use player publicity rights “after the term of the Agreement.” The addition of this language supports the claim in the Dryer case that the NFL did not have these rights in contracts made prior to 2011. The suit continues to progress, with hundreds of thousands of pages of discovery ex-changed and reviewed. An Amended Complaint was filed on November 15, 2011, to re-flect modifications including consolidation of a number of similar lawsuits, and counsel continue to work closely with our experts to analyze the strongest positions to argue and support. The Complaint can be found at: http://www.retiredfootballplayerslawsuit.com/pdf/NFL-A-Complaint.pdf

Swathi Bojedla is an Associate Attorney with Hausfeld LLP

C. Imaging Rights Litigation - Fred Dryer, et al. v. NFL


The Voice

On April 13, 2011, Bob Grant, Clinton Jones, Walter Roberts, Marvin Cobb, and Bernard Par-rish filed a Complaint against the NFLPA and NFL Players Inc. On June 10, 2011, Plaintiffs filed their First Amended Complaint alleging claims for breach of fiduciary duty and for accounting. On September 19, 2011, the Court Denied Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss the First Amended Complaint.

On April 18, 2012, Defendants filed a Motion for Summary Judgment.

On May 23, 2012, the Court Granted Defendants’ Motion for Summary Judgment.

D. Bob Grant, et al. v. NFLPA


For copies of the decision in this case, please email Hausfeld LLP at [email protected]

The Voice

* Hausfeld LLP and Zelle Hof-mann are legal counsel repre-senting retirees in issues ranging from union misconduct effecting retiree pensions and disability benefits; health consequences of football related concussions; and economic rights of retirees with respect to their names, images and likeness.

Hausfeld LLP 1700 K Street, NW Suite 650 Washington, DC 20006 Phone: (202) 540-7200 Fax: (202) 540-7201 www.hausfeldllp.com

Zelle Hofmann 500 Washington Avenue South Suite 4000 Minneapolis, MN 55415 Phone: (612) 339-2020 Fax: (612) 336-9100 www.zelle.com

DISCLAIMER The materials and information within this newsletter are made available by Hausfeld LLP and Zelle Hofmann, LLP for informational purposes only and should not be con-sidered legal advice. The transmission and receipt of information within this newslet-ter do not form or constitute an attorney-client relationship. Persons receiving the information via this newsletter should not act upon the information provided without seeking professional legal counsel.

Some links within this newsletter may lead to other websites. Hausfeld LLP and Zelle Hofmann, LLP do not incorporate any materials appearing in such linked sites by ref-erence, and the firms do not necessarily sponsor, endorse and/or otherwise approve of such linked materials.

Please Visit Our Unified NFL Retiree Groups on the Web at:

Retired Players Association

www.nflretiredplayersassociation.com

Gridiron Greats

www.gridirongreats.org

Fourth and Goal

www.fourthandgoalunites.com

Dignity After Football

www.dignityafterfootball.org

Independent Football Veterans

www.davepear.com

Jeff Nixon Report

http://blog.nflalumniassociation.com

EDITOR'S NOTE The Voice is in-tended to communi-cate to all retired NFL players, updates con-cerning key-issues effecting NFL retiree rights and benefits. It will provide an objec-tive independent re-port of matters of sig-nificant interest to those already retired.

the voice - nfl retiree newsletter, vol 1, issue 4

Documents

parents hadnt

traumatic

mary ann easterling

federal district

guardian angel

ways strikingly

humanitarian

mary ann discovered