Apropos of nothing, the firm's founder, John Morgan, has been instrumental in attempting to legalize marijuana in Florida, which some have identified as a potential, but very funny, conflict of interest given the type of work Morgan and Morgan does.
To be fair, "ambulance chaser" lawyer or not, over 90% of civil cases in general in the US settle before a trial commences.
For claims significantly less than the defendant's assets, if the defendant is likely to be found liable, they may need to pay the plaintiff's losses as well as lawyer and court costs; settling before court most likely reduces the cost and provides certainty. For the plaintiff, settling before court may reduce the award, but provides it faster and with certainty.
For claims larger than the defendant's assets, typical cases involve an insurance company and in some cases a trial award that's above policy limits may be payable the insurance company if a settlement offer below the limits was offered by the plaintiff and not accepted by the insurance company (keyword: excess judgement), but if the plaintiff is on their own they may not care one way or the other --- a settlement they can't pay might be the same as a judgement they can't pay, perhaps delay and hope is preferred, perhaps they may be able to negotiate a settlement that they can pay. For the plaintiff, if there's only $X from the defendant, using it on legal costs is a loss, so settlement is preferable, especially if there's a chance of the defendant making the assets unavailable.
The incentives for settlement aren't so much about what plaintiffs' lawyers or defendants' lawyers are up to, but about how courts operate. Certainly lawyers have some influence on operation of courts, but it's a big combination of things, and IMHO, it falls more under government policy than anything else. If courts were staffed such that you could reliably expect to take an injury case from complaint to judgement in 6 weeks, maybe more people would do it. Of course, that might require more omniscience than is possible.
My understanding is that over 90% of criminal cases also settle before trial commences.
It is strictly regulated how much money Morgan and Morgan can get out of someone who they represent.
They are all over social media ( tiktok,youtube ) crime videos. Never heard of them until I started watching crime videos online.
> Apropos of nothing, the firm's founder, John Morgan, has been instrumental in attempting to legalize marijuana in Florida
Makes sense. There is some correlation between drug use and crime.
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/05/15/john-morgan-florida...
Let the copyright on a work expire so I can share my copy of Toy Story with my friends, but retain a trademark on the characters so that I can't go around making new Toy Story movies (or theme parks or pajamas).
But ten years
A decade is enough
IP is a trade off, and the balance is wonky
The issue is that some of the specific expressions of the elements may be extremely distinctive, and trademarked by a person (or company) for commercial use. In those situations, you can still use the element, but not the specific expression of that element that is trademarked because that specific expression is being used by another person for ongoing commercial activities. However, unlike copyright, trademarks die if they are not kept in relatively continuous commercial use, generally 3 years after last use.
For example: the Winnie the Pooh horror movie. The specific version of Winnie the Pooh in the animated films is trademarked by Disney. The version that is a serial killer wearing a costume is not. Disney didn't bother to try and stop the film. So, if you wanted to make versions of the Toy Story character that don't look like the animated versions, you'd be in the clear once the copyright expires.
But the Morgan and Morgan ad is different. They're attempting to use trademarked characters for their own commercial purposes. (And there's no clear parody of Steamboat Willie; in the original cartoon he causes a bunch of accidents that harm other characters including the character that would become Minnie, so what is the parody here?) Unless they've made a sizable donation to the judge's bank account, they have no chance of winning their motion as there is over a century of case law against. OTOH, given the current administration and the openness of his appointees to disregarding centuries of existing law, it's very possible that Morgan and Morgan expects to win this case.
As an aside, Morgan and Morgan is generally regarded as the worst of the large personal injury law firms. In cases in which other PI firms sued the same defendants, the M&M plaintiffs got the smallest settlements, because M&M settles as early in the case as possible (usually before discovery) as their business model is based on quick, cheap settlements and they'll put heavy pressure on clients to accept the low-ball offers to avoid having to spend the time or labor costs of going through discovery. There are many complaints of M&M pressuring their own clients, fraudulent billing, withheld settlements, dropped cases, and bait-and-switch fees. They're the most sanctioned law firm in the country...by a lot...
Here's a quick thought experiment: Suppose I create a small movie company based on another character also in the public domain, and I successfully receive a trademark for my logo, which is... Jesus Christ.
Does/Should that give me control over anyone selling or distributing other books, movies, pictures, and songs depicting Jesus?
In a sane world, the answer is "heck no", because trademarks are really about stopping fraud, where someone else is trying to leech off my good reputation by confusing people into doing business with them instead.
Now, one might plausibly argue that Jesus is "generic" and thus the original trademark was wrongly granted, but the same principles apply even if I rebrand under just one of the less-popular characters or symbols. ("As the owner Pontius Pilate Productions, your story violates my trademark!")
On this case specifically, you can't make a Mickey Mouse cartoon in a way that looks like it came from Disney. That's all that the trademark protects.
Morgan and Morgan should just launch the commercial, it sounds hilarious
Not a lawyer, but to bring a lawsuit in the US you typically have to show that you've suffered a real injury that the court can remedy. How can Morgan and Morgan establish standing here?
That's some insane mental gymnastics. If copyright expired the IP is no longer theirs. And they don't protect but make extortion attempt under false pretense instead with use of fraudulent claims.
In both cases the company has zero rights to the underlying public thing, and the court just needs to ask: "Is someone trying to trick consumers into mis-identifying the company or product?"
P.S.: Even if the company transitioned into being a seller of commemorative Statue of Liberty figurines, their trademarked logo shouldn't give them the ability to monopolize the subject matter. In that other context it might even be revoked as too-generic and unenforceable.
If they can meet the bar established in TDRA they can probably squash all usage of Willie, even in unrelated-industries usage not intended to confuse consumers, in the same way that you can't market "Coca-Cola bedsheets" or a "Google Bicycle" without a license from the trademark holder.
The real ad here is them baiting Disney and running this fairly open and shut case. Of cause they can use public domain material in their commercial and Disney can’t prevent them.
Mickey is still a trademark of the Disney corporation.
You're right though. This is an open and shut case that Morgan and Morgan will lose. There's only several decades of case law on this...
Mickey, yeah. But steamboat willie is covered by a copyright that has now since expired.
If this was a case that Morgan and Morgan expected to win they would not have withdrawn the ad.
That they did indicates that they don't even believe their own claims.
