Sixteen years after Dr. Ronald Cunning obtained a multi-million dollar judgment against Lloyd Rucker, a federal court once again ruled the victim can take steps towards collecting over $1million that was seized from Rucker 8 years ago.  This victory is just the latest hurdle of many that Dr. Cunning and his tenacious team of trial lawyers led by Thomas H. Bienert, Jr. at Bienert | Katzman have overcome.  After being defrauded in 1994, Dr. Cunning obtained a verdict for $3.2 million in 1997, located and seized over $1 million from Rucker in 2005, obtained a court order after a trial in 2006 that he could collect the money, and then successfully rebuffed Rucker’s appeal of that order in 2009. But before he could finally collect the money in 2009, a bankruptcy trustee sued Cunning for the same proceeds, claiming that Cunning did not properly serve Rucker with legal documents in 2005 and, consequently, the trustee could take the money to pay creditors of Rucker’s bankruptcy. The Trustee took this position despite the fact that Dr. Cunning was by far the largest creditor in the bankruptcy, being owed 90% of the money owed by Rucker to creditors.

Dr. Cunning expressed gratitude over the latest ruling of the court and the efforts of his trial team. Dr. Cunning noted that “throughout the years, I have been very thankful for, and appreciative of, the talent and hard work of my trial counsel. It has been a long haul for all of us,” and that he is “delighted that we have achieved some measure of justice.”