Another painful loss

Less than a year after Chuck’s death, the N.F.L. agreed to pay $765 million to settle a lawsuit brought by thousands of players and their families, who said the league concealed the dangers of repeated hits to the head. A lawyer who was a longtime family friend, Manuel Miller, helped Kathleen gather the medical records she needed to file a claim.

To help with the settlement process, Miller brought in a powerhouse L.A. lawyer who was working with hundreds of other former players and their families: Tom Girardi. He had earned fame by winning a record settlement for the environmental activist Erin Brockovich and was known for standing up for the little guy against big corporations.

“I trusted him,” Kathleen said.

The terms of the settlement were finalized in April 2015. The families of players who had died with C.T.E. before that date were eligible for up to $4 million. Kathleen was set to receive nearly $2.5 million after fees. The money would be a relief.

Kathleen and Dennis, the stepfather who raised Chuck, live on a fixed income. Dennis is retired from a union job as a videotape operator and Kathleen stayed home to raise their kids. Chuck had always been there for Kathleen, and now, it seemed he was coming through for her again.

“See, Mom?” Linda, her daughter, told her. “Chuckie always said he was going to take care of you.”

But years went by, and Kathleen still didn’t receive most of the money, even though the funds from her claim were paid to Girardi’s law firm in 2018, according to a person with knowledge of Girardi’s involvement in the settlement who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.

Girardi stalled, sometimes taking months to return Kathleen’s calls. In one voice mail message, Girardi assured her he was working for her. He said he knew she had already been through so much.

Kathleen was still waiting in December 2020 when a judge in Chicago froze Girardi’s assets, finding he had misappropriated at least $2 million in client funds that were supposed to go to families of people killed in the 2018 Lion Air plane crash in Indonesia.