If I sue someone for a large amount of money, win the case, but they cannot afford the cost, what happens?

Question

I randomly was thinking about the Bobby Brown/Bobbi Kristina vs Nick Gordon case where the judge ordered Gordon to pay $36 million to Bobbi's estate for the wrongful death case.

And it made me wonder...For the every day person that can't afford such a loss through their assets, how is the payment made? Who foots the bill? Is the cost covered in some other way? Would they then need to file bankruptcy?


All real help is appreciated :)

Answer 1

This is an appropriate application for the saying "You can't squeeze blood out of a turnip". If there is nothing to get, the winner gets nothing. That's why lawyers are eager to sue insurance companies but not so eager to sue individuals.

Answer 2

OJ owes 30 million....he gets 25 million NFL pension per month....can't take that...social security...cant take that...a house in florida...can't take that...that's why he bought property in florida...probably earns 3 dollars a day in prison job...probably can garnish about 50 bucks a week if he works 7 days per week

Answer 3

Nobody else is going to magically come up with the money. If the guy can't pay, then bankruptcy is an option. But check out this article (link).

Answer 4

If someone sued a worker at mcdonalds earning minimum wage the court would have to order a payment based on the persons assets or current income. so they would most like say if someone earned 40k a year they would order maybe a 10k pay out or what ever is in their savings account

Answer 5

Winning and getting are two very separate things....... I was awarded in court a large amount of money and it took me 10 yrs to get it and the ONLY reason I got it was I sacked my legal representation sat in the legal library and did the legal work myself and for that 10 yrs I continually used every legal action I could taking them back to court a couple of times a year, meaning they were having to pay legal advisors and continually having to return to court and basically I used every legal action against them, costing them money and time so it was cheaper for them to pay me as they knew I was not going to stop.....

If you take them back to court you pay and they pay if legally represented, so you/they foot the bill, you can put a charge on their home if they have one, but only useful if they have equality in their home and you only get paid if they sell it or if you then legally for a sale and that could take years to never, you can make them bankrupt, it costs you to do so and if you do you 'might' only get a percentage of what they owe you the rest is lost, you can get a court order to get their assets, so taking their car, their gadgets, their furniture, TV, bikes etc which are sold at auction but if it doesn't sell for the amount owed then you only get that amount, you can get a legal garnishment on their wages if they are employed and earning and it is taken by the employer before they get paid, again it costs to do that... depends on the reason, depends on the laws which depends on the country

Answer 6

They file bankruptcy and everything goes bye-bye.

Answer 7

Nothing.