She won her lawsuit battle against Terry Sanderson and became a meme sensation with her kiss-off line — “I wish you well ” — but Gwyneth Paltrow’s day in court will still cost her. A judge said on Saturday the “Shakespeare in Love” actor won’t recoup her attorneys’ fees.
In the weekend ruling, District Court Judge Kent Holmberg said attorneys for Paltrow and Sanderson had dropped the matter of those fees, though he didn’t specify why, according to The Associated Press.
Paltrow faced off against Sanderson in a Park City courtroom in March over a 2016 collision on the local ski slopes. Sanderson, a retired optometrist, had sued Paltrow, claiming she crashed into him and caused him injuries. Paltrow filed a countersuit, arguing it was he who caused the accident.
Ultimately, a jury decided Paltrow wasn’t to blame, awarding her the symbolic $1 she had requested for damages. Paltrow had also asked for her attorney fees to be reimbursed, but that was left to the judge to decide.
Regardless of who was to blame for the ski crash, Paltrow could have avoided the spectacle of the livestreamed trial by settling with Sanderson out of court, but she “felt that acquiescing to a false claim compromised [her] integrity,” as she explained in an Instagram statement following the verdict.
“I am pleased with the outcome and I appreciate all of the hard work of Judge Holmberg and the jury, and thank them for their thoughtfulness in handling this case,” she added.
As for Sanderson, he told reporters outside the courtroom that the lawsuit was “absolutely not” worth it, though he must now be relieved to not be on the hook for Paltrow’s legal fees. Legal experts previously told CBS News that Sanderson might have had to pay up to $1 million to cover the cost of Paltrow’s defense.