The lawsuit between Neal Rauhauser and Bullyville (James McGibney) has been going on for years, making it all the way to the Texas Supreme Court, but that’s where Rauhauser’s petition was denied today.

We’ve come a long way from the judgment day when narcoleptic Judge Cosby awarded Rauhauser a million dollars in sanctions, the highest amount ever awarded in an anti-SLAPP suit in the United States, plus over $300,000 in legal fees. I remember Neal telling everyone about his million dollar award, slipping it into conversations on social media, bragging about it in his blog posts, sending out press releases, he even put it on his LinkedIn resume. But that million ain’t gonna happen.

As it stands now, the amount awarded to Rauhauser is $0.00 and he’s been ordered by the court to pay McGibney’s legal fees for the appeal so he’s about to go in the hole. 

Once McGibney has been reimbursed, the case will go back to Cosby at the lower court where the legal fees awarded to Rauhauser will be adjusted downward considerably. These are the fees to attorney Jeffrey Dorrell that the Appeals court determined were padded, excessive, and too heavily redacted to even verify. 

Legal fees will probably be lowered down to $5,000 or thereabouts, though the amount doesn’t really matter since Rauhauser owes around $80,000 for the child support he hasn’t paid in the last decade. The state of Nebraska has a lien on any money awarded in this case.

Tom Retzlaff has claimed that he bought Rauhauser’s judgment settlement in the case back when he and his attorney thought they were winning. I don’t know if that’s true but if it is… Oops.