A New York state appellate court has rejected Wayne LaPierre\u2019s appeal of the monetary judgment and injunction levied against him after a state jury in 2024 found that he violated his fiduciary duties in his role as an officer of the National Rifle Association (NRA).<\/p>\n
One June 2, the Appellate Division, First Judicial Department of the New York State Supreme Court, upheld both a jury order requiring him to repay $4.3 million in damages to the NRA and a court order prohibiting him from holding any fiduciary position as an officer or director of the NRA or any NRA entity for 10 years.<\/p>\n
LaPierre, the former executive vice president of the NRA, had argued in his appeal that the jury could not order him to pay monetary damages as part of the law requiring him to \u201caccount for\u201d his conduct; rather he could only be required to explain his conduct. But the appellate court disagreed. The court said LaPierre misconstrued the scope and language of the statute and that the phrase \u201caccount for\u201d is not so limited, as it also encompasses a \u201creckoning of funds and holding the violating officer responsible for the harm caused.\u201d Thus, the court upheld the judgment that he repay $4.3 million of the total $5.4 million in harm he caused to the NRA, as he had already paid back about $1.1 million.<\/p>\n
LaPierre also tried to argue that his resignation from his position on the eve of trial, which was effective four weeks into the jury trial, invalidated the court\u2019s injunctive relief. Again, the appellate court disagreed, finding that it is well settled that \u201cvoluntary cessation of allegedly illegal conduct does not deprive the tribunal of power to hear and determine the case, i.e., does not make the case moot,\u201d since the \u201cdefendant is free to return to his old ways.\u201d<\/p>\n
The appellate court also noted that the 10-year ban does not burden LaPierre\u2019s rights to freedom of speech and association since he remains a member of the NRA and is not precluded from making any public statements or involving himself in fundraising or other outreach.<\/p>\n
New York Attorney General Letitia James brought the original suit against LaPierre, Chief Financial Officer Wilson Phillips, and Corporate Secretary John Frazer on behalf of the NRA.<\/p>\n
The jury found that the NRA failed to properly administer charitable funds and protect whistleblowers, that the NRA and Frazer made false regulatory filings, and that LaPierre and Phillips, together, caused the organization $7.4 million in monetary harm. In addition to requiring LaPierre to pay $4.3 million, Phillips was ordered to pay $2 million plus interest.<\/p>\n
The jury found that LaPierre misspent millions of the NRA\u2019s funds on an extravagant lifestyle that included exotic getaways and trips on private planes and super-yachts.<\/p>\n
\u201cWayne LaPierre and other senior NRA leaders broke the law by funneling millions of dollars in lavish perks to themselves and their families,\u201d said Attorney General James. \u201cThis decision upholds the jury\u2019s verdict and is another victory in our efforts to ensure that LaPierre is held accountable for his illegal self-dealing.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a statement to Courthouse News<\/a>, LaPierre\u2019s lawyer Kent Correll said his client will appeal and expects the claims to be eventually thrown out by the New York Court of Appeals or by the U.S. Supreme Court.<\/p>\n Top Photo: Wayne LaPierre<\/p>\n \n Topics Interested in Gun Liability?<\/p>\n Get automatic alerts for this topic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A New York state appellate court has rejected Wayne LaPierre\u2019s appeal of the monetary judgment and injunction levied…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":852922,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,348319,348320,405,173379,403,348321,5226,5225,5228,5227,67,586,132,5230,68,2969,79068],"class_list":["post-852921","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-america","tag-fiduciary-liability","tag-national-rifle-association-nra","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-attorney-general-letitia-james","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-v-nra","tag-newyork","tag-newyorkcity","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa","tag-wayne-lapierre"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116714770745103698","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/852921","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=852921"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/852921\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/852922"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=852921"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=852921"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=852921"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n New York<\/a>
\n Leadership<\/a>\n <\/p>\n