Although Jameis Winston's accuser, Erica Kinsman, and the Florida State University has reached a settlement on the Title IX lawsuit, a separate case between Kinsman and Winston is currently predicted to continue until well into 2018.
Florida State University president John Thrasher has released a statement announcing that a settlement has finally concluded the legal battle with Title IX case. According to the New York Times, the settlement states that the university is to pay Kinsman $950,000 and to continue taking steps to prevent sexual abuse in the campus for a couple of years.
Thrasher also stated that the main reason they went for a settlement to conclude the case is in order to avoid "additional litigation expenses". "We have an obligation to our students, their parents and Florida taxpayers to deal with this case, as we do with all litigation, in a financially responsible manner", he said.
The FSU president further claimed that $700,000 of the settlement will go to Kinsman's lawyers which will leave Kinsman with $250,000. However, such claims were immediately dismissed by Kinsman's attorney saying that they will get "not even close" to $700,000.
However, the settlement does not end the legal battle between Winston and Kinsman as the latter filed another case against the current Tampa Bay Buccaneers player. According to CNN, the separate lawsuit accuses Winston of sexual battery, false imprisonment and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
Kinsman is also to use her settlement money to help the fund the other case. A month later Kinsman filed her lawsuit, Winston also filed a counter lawsuit stating that she purposely tarnished his image by having consensual sexual relation with him, only to declare it as the opposite in public.
According to Tampa Bay Times, a Stetson University law professor said that although the Title IX case, the litigation process in Kinsman and Winston's case could continue until 2018 despite its scheduled trial in the US District court in March 2017.
"It's not going to go into (next) March," director of Stetson's Center for Excellence in Advocacy Charles H. Rose III said. "Civil litigation rarely, if ever, moves that quickly".
It is predicted that the lawsuit could last until March 2018 as the discovery phase could push the trial further. However, it is always possible for the case to end up through a settlement between both parties.
