Jury awards Hulk Hogan $115 million in sex tape suit
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — A jury sided with ex-pro wrestler Hulk Hogan on Friday and awarded him $115 million in his sex tape lawsuit against Gawker Media.
The jurors reached the decision Friday evening, less than six hours after they began deliberations. The trial lasted two weeks.
Earlier Friday, in spirited closing arguments, lawyers for Hogan and Gawker discussed themes of personal life versus celebrity, and freedom of speech versus the right to privacy.
Hogan, whose given name is Terry Bollea, sued Gawker for $100 million for posting a video of him having sex with his former best friend’s wife. Hogan contended the 2012 post violated his privacy.
Hogan’s attorneys told jurors this is the core of the case: “Gawker took a secretly recorded sex tape and put it on the Internet.”
They said Hogan didn’t consent to the video, that Gawker didn’t follow usual journalism procedures before posting it and that the video wasn’t newsworthy. Gawker did not try to contact Bollea or the woman in the video, nor did the website contact the woman’s husband, DJ Bubba The Love Sponge Clem, who recorded the video. It was never conclusively determined during trial who leaked the video to the media.
Hogan didn’t ask for any of this to happen, lawyer Kenneth Turkel said, adding that Bollea, the private man, expected privacy during an intimate moment.