“We can not accept Ventura’s unjust-enrichment theory because it enjoys no legal support under Minnesota law”, they wrote”.
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In his memoir, Chris Kyle wrote that he punched Ventura in a southern California bar following the funeral of a fellow Navy SEAL after Ventura, a former SEAL, made remarks critical of the Iraq war and former U.S. President George W. Bush and said the SEALs deserved “to lose a few”.
The main reason for the court’s decision, it said, is because jurors were greatly influenced by defense claims at trial that any payout would be covered by the publisher’s insurance policy – not the Kyle family.
The lawsuit was filed before Kyle was killed at a shooting range by a troubled vet he had befriended. Both awards stemmed from a 2014 trial. The court didn’t opine on the merits of Ventura’s case, but chose instead to send the case back to trial, noting that Ventura’s lawyers had made prejudicial statements during the first trial that could have contributed to such a high jury award. Kyle later identified Ventura as that man, said the Star Tribune.
The biggest part of the original judgment was for “unjust enrichment”. Kyle “laid him out”, he wrote. He says he can’t go to SEAL reunions because the book ruined his reputation in the military community.
Mr Kyle, regarded as the deadliest military sniper in U.S. history, was shot dead by a veteran at a Texas shooting range in February 2013.
In 2014, a Minnesota jury determined Ventura should awarded $500,000 in damages and $1.3 million in “unjust enrichment”, which is a term used by the court when someone profits at the expense of another.
You can read Monday’s ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals (or Fox News’ write-up) for the specifics if you want. The jury could not reach a unanimous verdict, voting 8-2 in favor of Ventura on the fifth day of its deliberation.
In order to prevail on such a claim, Ventura would have had to establish that he had at least a “preexisting contractual or quasi-contractual relationship with Kyle”, the ruling said. “Scruff Face ended up on the floor”, according to the court documents.
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Jesse Ventura’s attorneys argued that Kyle’s widow had nothing to worry about and would be allowed to “plead for poverty if an insurance company is going to pick up the tab”. He also found that the $500,000 award for defamation was not excessive.
