Buffalo, N.Y. (WBEN) - After a long eight-year legal battle with Cumulus Media, the Buffalo Jills have settled their lawsuit in bankruptcy court.
According to one report, Cumulus, which was preceded by Citadel Broadcasting, has come to a settlement of $4 million, under which the company admits no wrongdoing. Cumulus, along with the Buffalo Bills, resolved all outstanding claims with more than 50 former cheerleaders represented in the class action. While the Bills argued in the past the radio station was fully at fault for the matter, the team will pay out $3.5 million.
When "97 Rock" WGRF was the flagship radio station of the Bills, Citadel managed the Jills, under an agreement with the NFL team's owner.
"It's an interesting piece of litigation from a number of perspectives. It's not the type of lawsuit you see every day in State Supreme Court. That makes it interesting," said attorney Terry Connors of Connors LLP. "It took eight years for this to finally be culminated in a settlement. That's a pretty long time. That's largely because there were a number of procedural hurdles along the way that were overcome by the plaintiffs. There were motions for summary judgment by both sides, and eventually the case ended up in bankruptcy court because one of the defendants filed for Chapter 11 protection - that was Cumulus, the predecessor of Citadel broadcasting. So from that standpoint, it makes it even more interesting, because you now have parallel jurisdictions involved.
"The bottom line is as they were preparing the case for trial, a settlement was negotiated, in which there was no admission of liability, the defendants did not claim that they were wrong, and they denied the allegation that they didn't treat the Jills fairly, according to the New York Labor Law. Obviously, the Jills disagree with that, and that's what brought it to a settlement. Then the terms and conditions of the settlement are a little bit different, because there are some stock payments along with some cash payments. That's a little bit unusual, but there's a lot about this case that was unusual until it was finally resolved."
The lawsuit was originally filed by in April of 2014 by five cheerleaders in New York State Supreme Court. Those cheerleaders alleged Citadel and the Bills violated New York Labor Law on numerous occasions, and owed the cheerleaders back pay because they were classified as independent contractors instead of classified as employees.
Connors believes the case took as long as it did to be settled not only because of the bankruptcy issues with Cumulus, but also other complicated procedural matters that took place.
"You have to admire the persistence of the lawyers - Dolce Panepinto and specifically Shawn Cooney, who was the lead lawyer on the case - they persevered through Appellate Division arguments, summary judgment matters, bankruptcy filings. That's not the ordinary course of a piece of litigation is filed in State Supreme Court. That's probably why it took so long," Connors said.
As for the settlement that was finalized, Connors says the best settlement is a settlement when neither side is happy.
"You can't really predict whether or not one side or the other is happy. All you can predict is that there was a payment when there was a payment denied, and entire responsibility denied by all the defendants. By the Buffalo Bills, the NFL, and by Citadel broadcasting. So from that standpoint, you have to deem it a success for the Jills to have received some recovery at all," he said. "Whether the recovery was commensurate with the loss is another question, because when the case was settled, the defendants indicated that they settled it because of the legal costs involved, the length of the trial, and they claimed it was a reduced amount of the settlement. That I can't I can't interpret one way or the other, but it was settled, and generally settled cases are the best types of cases."
According to the report, the lawsuit was settled back in early March, nearly three weeks ago. Why did it take so long for the news of this settlement to be picked up?
"I think it was because the case was tied up in this procedural morass that it didn't have any attention. There was no public testimony or really public important filings about the case that generated publicity. So what happened is the case worked its way procedurally through Supreme Court and then bankruptcy court, and ultimately to a settlement," Connors explained.
Shortly after the lawsuit was brought about in 2014, the Jills had operations suspended by team management, and the group has not been revived since.
