Gawker and Hulk Hogan Reach $31 Million Settlement

Gawker Media, which filed for bankruptcy after losing a lawsuit brought by the former professional wrestler Hulk Hogan, has settled the case, bringing to a close a multiyear saga that led to the demise of the company as an independent news organization. The settlement, which court documents indicate is for $31 million, comes less than eight months after a jury awarded Hogan, whose real name is Terry G. Bollea, $140 million in damages in an invasion of privacy case lawsuit over Gawker.com’s publication of a video that showed Bollea having sex with a friend’s wife. Gawker will forgo its appeal of that judgment.

The significant financial pressure from the judgment — and the revelation that Peter Thiel, the billionaire Silicon Valley entrepreneur, was financing the lawsuit and others against the company — forced Gawker to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and sell itself through an auction, which Univision won in August with a bid of $135 million.