NICOLE Kidman and Keith Urban face the tough task of dividing their staggering £210million property portfolio as part of their divorce settlement.
The former couple’s marriage is now officially over after the superstar pair finalised their split this week, and they’ve come to an agreement on how their collection of multi-million pound homes will be divvied up.
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Nicole Kidman and ex-husband Keith Urban are splitting their huge property portfolio as part of their divorceCredit: APThe former couple owned SIX apartments in this Sydney blockCredit: BackGrid
According to documents seen by the Daily Mail, both Nicole and Keith will retain ownership of the properties already in their possession and the rest will be split to their mutual satisfaction.
It is believed the majority of the exes’ properties were all jointly purchased following their wedding in 2006.
The most recent purchase came in 2023 in the form of a £5.7m three-bed apartment in Sydney‘s exclusive Landmark Latitude complex – their sixth property in the same high rise.
They have another £13.3m wrapped up in the complex.
Nicole and Keith first bought into the apartment block in 2009, picking up a sizeable 420-square-metre pad overlooking the city’s famous harbour for a cool £4.45m.
A further £5.2m was splashed on a larger neighbouring apartment when that became available in 2012.
The couple bought into the 19th floor in 2011, paying £2m on a smaller space that Nicole used as a home office.
Variety is the spice of life, and Nicole and Keith diversified over the years, adding mansions to their portfolio.
Music mecca Nashville was first on their list.
They bought a huge 20-room home in the city back in 2008 for a seemingly reasonable £2.6million.
It was their primary home throughout their married years and a sanctuary away from bright lights.
Nicole previously said: “Keith and I are very good at immediately clicking off because we have a really good life in Nashville that’s very simple, quiet, and nourishing because we’ve made it like that.”
It’s likely Nicole will remain here as she has been granted the primary custody of their children.
A five-bedroom Beverly Hills bolt hole quickly followed for £3.5million, a perfect base for Hollywood queen Nicole. It has an outdoor pool with a slide and a stunning views of the city from is wrap-around terrace.
The pair also had sights set on property on the East Coast.
Their biggest purchase saw them drop a huge £10.03million on a 10th floor Manhattan duplex complete with futuristic elevator, before adding a smaller, stylishly designed apartment in trendy Tribeca to the books in 2020 for a comparatively cheap £4.2million.
One of them will now need to change their retirement plan, though.
They picked up a six-bedroom home full of character in New South Wales on a sprawling 45 hectare site in 2008 for £4.8m.
A working farm that is home to alpacas and cows, it features a guest cottage perfect for those travelling to the remote location.
There’s plenty in the way of entertainment too with an 18-metre pool and tennis court.
It would have been the perfect place to spend quiet, contemplative days outdoors when it’s time to hang up their working boots.
Meanwhile, court documents obtained by Page Six reveal that Nicole and Keith have waived all child and spousal support.
The former couple’s two daughters, Sunday Rose, 17, and Faith Margaret, 15, will stay with Nicole for 306 days a year.
Keith will spend 59 days, or “every other weekend” with them, according to court documents.
The pair’s Nashville mansion acted as their primary homeCredit: BackGridThe had a character property set in sprawling grounds in New South WalesCredit: SplashThe Beverly Hills mansion had a pool and slide and a large sun terrace with stunning viewsCredit: BackGrid
Nicole and Keith, both 58, agreed to not pay child support, citing reported monthly incomes exceeding $100,000 each.
They also agreed not to pay alimony or spousal support, making each party responsible for their own legal fees.
The former couple decided that all property – including investments, bank accounts, vehicles, and personal items – will be divided by mutual agreement, and each person will keep what they already have.
It remains unclear if they had a prenuptial agreement.
Nicole waived her right to be in court on Tuesday, as she had returned from Australia with her daughters the previous day.
The settlement comes just months after Nicole filed for divorce on September 30, citing “irreconcilable differences.”
A source told the Sun at the time that Nicole and Keith had been “living separate lives” for three years prior to their split.
The insider revealed that Nicole’s back-to-back filming schedule and Keith’s world tour made it difficult for the couple to see each other.
Nicole was reportedly “blindsided” by the split after helping Keith through his struggles with alcohol addiction.
Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban’s Relationship Timeline
Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban have been one of Hollywood’s ‘It” couples for nearly two decades. However, their relationship took a turn in September 2025, when news broke that the pair had separated and were living apart. Here’s a look back at the timeline of their romance.
January 2005 – Nicole and Keith were introduced by actor Geoffrey Rush during the G’Day LA Gala Ball.
February 2006 – The couple made their public debut as an item at the 48th Annual Grammy Awards.
May 2006 – Keith’s publicist revealed that he and Nicole were “very happily engaged.”
June 2006 – The two tied the knot at a chapel in Manly, Australia, surrounded by many famous guests.
October 2006 – Keith checked himself into rehab for drug and alcohol issues at the urging of his new wife.
December 2006 – Model Amanda Wyatt claimed that Keith had cheated on Nicole with her multiple times, leading up to their nuptials.
January 2008 – Nicole’s rep revealed that she and Keith were expecting their first child together.
July 2008 – Keith and Nicole welcomed their first child, a daughter named Sunday Rose.
December 2010 – The duo introduced their second child, Faith Margaret, to the world, whom they welcomed via surrogate.
July 2015 – Nicole confessed to Vogue that she wished she’d met Keith earlier in life, so that they could’ve had more children together.
June 2016 – Keith opened up to Rolling Stone about how Nicole helped him get sober by insisting that he go to rehab a decade earlier.
October 2018 – Nicole gushed about her simple, quiet life in Nashville with Keith, and said that was the secret to their happy marriage.
June 2021 – Keith shared a sweet Instagram post, commemorating his and Nicole’s 15th wedding anniversary.
July 2024 – Keith, Nicole, and their daughters were seen enjoying the Gymnastics Women’s Team Final at the Paris Olympics.
April 2025 – Nicole referred to Keith as her “deep, deep love” during an interview with People, and said she was “lucky” to have the musician.
September 2025 – TMZ announced that Nicole and Keith had separated and were no longer living together, and Nicole filed for divorce.
January 2026 – Nicole and Keith’s divorce is finalized.
Keith appeared to reference Maggie in a song lyric originally written for Nicole.
“When they’re tryna get to you, Maggie I’ll be your guitar player,” Keith sang in a video posted to Maggie’s Instagram on September 28.
The original lyric goes, “When they’re tryna get to you, baby I’ll be the fighter.”
Keith previously told Billboard about the song: “It’s all from a conversation my wife and I had early on in our relationship, that when things get tough, I need to hold her tighter and just try to take care of her.“
Sereen Banna said the partners of Downtown LA Law Group called her “Erin Brockovich” for her work helping hundreds sue over noxious fumes spewing out of a landfill in northern Los Angeles County.
An ambitious paralegal, Banna said she embraced the role she had in empowering residents to take on companies suspected of polluting their neighborhoods.
Her bosses were proud, too, she said. Banna, 28, recalled them saying she would make them all billionaires someday.
But in early 2024, Banna said, she discovered a troubling trend in some of the firm’s most lucrative cases: Clients who claimed they were paid before joining lawsuits.
On Dec. 16, Banna sued Downtown LA Law Group, also known as DTLA, stating the firm failed to address her complaints about “illegal solicitation, as well as deceptive and unethical practices aimed at persuading individuals to become clients through misrepresentations.”
She accused the firm, which she left in the fall of 2024, of amassing plaintiffs through “practices that appeared designed to exploit vulnerable individuals.”
DTLA called the allegations “baseless,” saying they came from a disgruntled former employee.
“Any allegations of fraud, paid referrals, or unethical practices by DTLA Law Group are not only unsubstantiated, but false,” the firm said in a statement. “We intend to fight this in the court of law, where the facts will show that we operate with unwavering integrity, prioritizing client welfare.”
Banna’s lawsuit caps a tumultuous year for DTLA. A partnership between three childhood friends, DTLA has grown from a small firm focused on car crash victims into a civil litigation powerhouse, filing thousands of cases related to the January wildfires and sexual abuse in government facilities. The firm filed nearly a quarter of the cases in the $4-billion sex abuse settlement approved last spring by Los Angeles County — the largest of its kind in U.S. history.
But the meteoric rise has drawn scrutiny.
The Times reported in the fall that nine of the firm’s clients who sued over sex abuse in L.A. County facilities said recruiters paid them to file a lawsuit, including four who said they were told to fabricate claims. The L.A. County district attorney’s office is now conducting a probe into the allegations.
With the investigation pending, questions have lingered about how DTLA managed to amass so many plaintiffs so quickly. The Times spoke to more than 40 of the firm’s clients and 10 former employees, many of whom described aggressive tactics to bring in new clients and reap profits stretching back years.
More than a dozen people represented by DTLA in personal injury cases said they were recruited at a crisis point in their lives with promises of massive payouts and pressured into expensive surgeries that attorneys said would make their case more valuable. The more medical procedures, they were told, the more damages attorneys could claim.
At the end, some clients say, they were left with a fraction of what they were promised.
DTLA said in a statement it exists “to support clients through some of the most difficult moments of their lives.”
“That includes helping them avoid unnecessary financial stress while their cases are pending,” the firm said. “Medical care decisions are made solely by clients and their physicians.”
Sereen Banna, a former DTLA paralegal, sued the firm on Dec. 16, alleging it did not listen to her complaints of unethical solicitation. The firm has denied wrongdoing.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
Banna said in her lawsuit she “repeatedly complained” about how clients were being solicited.
She said in an interview she reported the first paid landfill client she was aware of — a woman who received a $20 gift card — to her bosses in early 2024. In her lawsuit, she alleged “such conduct constitutes unlawful and unethical behavior for attorneys.”
She said her boss told her the alleged payments would be investigated.
“At that point, I was reminded it was above my pay grade,” she said.
‘A really big part of the recruitment process’
Banna said she resigned from DTLA in October 2024, around the time the firm began pursuing a new cohort of clients: human trafficking victims who’d been abused in hotels.
Banna said one of her colleagues, an intake coordinator, told her a man named Kevin Johnson had paid one sex worker $20 to come into the office.
Over the last two years, five ex-workers told The Times, Johnson became an increasingly common sight at the firm as he started shepherding in clients he’d found to sue over sex abuse in the juvenile halls and the Eaton fire. Like most former employees, the ex-workers requested anonymity, fearing professional retaliation.
Johnson, a 54-year-old entertainer who hosts gospel brunches and soul nights in Inglewood according to his social media, did not respond to messages or a letter left at his home. The firm is currently representing him in a lawsuit over a Mid-City car crash.
California law bans a practice known as capping, in which non-attorneys solicit clients to join litigation with a firm. DTLA has denied working with cappers and Johnson did not respond to questions about his recruitment for the firm.
Former employees said Johnson was responsible for bringing in a large number of clients.
“He is a really big part of the recruitment process for Downtown LA,” said Banna, who described how she was called to do intake with sex abuse clients after Johnson brought them into the offices of one of the partners.
Johnson wasn’t a DTLA employee, yet workers say he was a familiar face around the office.
He was close with the partners and chummy with employees, handing out lucky $2 bills to workers last holiday season, three former employees said. Two said that at one point he had his own swipe card, so he could come and go freely.
A digital trail connects Johnson to DTLA’s client list.
The Times found more than a dozen friends of Johnson’s on Facebook who appeared to have a sex abuse lawsuit filed with the county. To do this, The Times cross-referenced a list of county sex abuse plaintiffs represented by DTLA with Johnson’s Facebook friends to see how many shared identifying details.
Larisa Ellis, whom Johnson describes on Facebook as his wife, paid someone who later had a DTLA sex abuse lawsuit $50 at a social services office in November 2024 with the payment caption “Thanks for using our referral service,” according to a Cash app transaction. Ellis did not respond to a message and a letter left at their home.
“DTLA does not pay clients to retain our services or for referrals,” the firm said in a statement.
Austin Beagle and Nevada Barker, former clients of DLTA, said they were paid to sue over alleged sexual abuse in L.A. County by a man named Kevin, whose last name they didn’t know. Beagle and Barker later had their lawsuit dismissed.
(Joe Garcia / For The Times)
Nevada Barker and Austin Beagle, two former DTLA clients, previously told The Times a man named Kevin, whose last name they didn’t know, paid them $100 each in DTLA’s office after they made false claims of sex abuse. Barker identified Johnson through pictures as the man who paid her.
The couple said they were under the impression they were being compensated to be actors in a movie. The firm later asked the court to dismiss their lawsuits.
“He said he worked for a referral service and the lawsuit needed enough participants to go through,” said Beagle. “He didn’t work for the law office.”
‘Tell her I got $ for her’
Several clients told The Times they were offered money by DTLA partner Farid Yaghoubtil if they could find people to sign up for lawsuits with the firm.
“He called it an advancement, ” said LaShelle Allison, 53, a former client who said she referred several car accident victims for Yaghoubtil. “Here’s $250,’ ‘Here’s $650,’ ‘Here’s $500 for rent.”
California is one of the few states where lawyers are allowed to loan clients money.
The State Bar has a general rule that lawyers are not supposed to pay “personal or business expenses.” The bar makes exceptions that include if the client promises in writing to repay the loan, for providing funds to promote “the interests of an indigent person,” and for “advancing costs” to protect a client, with repayment contingent on the outcome of the matter.
DTLA said in a statement that it offers small loans to clients “in limited situations.”
“The firm has offered small, interest-free micro-advances to help with short-term needs like temporary housing or basic expenses, specifically so clients do not feel compelled to turn to third-party lenders,” the firm said. “These advances are entirely voluntary, never tied to medical or legal decisions, and are only recovered if a case is successfully resolved.”
Akeem Smith, 40, had DTLA sue on his behalf at least four times, twice for car crashes, once after he was punched at a night club and again over a shopping cart mishap at Rite Aid.
Smith referred 10 potential clients to Yaghoubtil, nearly all car crash victims, according to text messages between the two men. In return, Smith said, he was told he’d be compensated, though he said he was disappointed to find he was never paid for the clients he referred.
Instead, Smith said he received monthly advances of about $2,000 based on potential settlements the firm was expecting in his cases.
Smith said he would encourage clients to sign up for cases with DTLA but did not pay them. He told some about money Yaghoubtil was offering.
“Tell her I got $ for her,” Yaghoubtil texted Aug. 9, 2022, regarding a woman who Smith said had been in an accident and was considering not moving forward with the firm. “Get her back for me.”
Akeem Smith stands in front of the old DTLA office in East Hollywood.
(Ronaldo Bolanos / Los Angeles Times)
After The Times reached out to DTLA seeking comment on the allegations made by Smith, Yaghoubtil texted Smith asking him to notify the reporter that “everything you told her was a lie” and to remind The Times that he was still a client of the firm, according to a message Smith shared.
The next day, after telling The Times he planned to go into DTLA’s office, Smith falsely accused the reporter via text of harassment and failing to disclose they were a journalist.
In August, Smith made an ill-fated attempt to sue the firm, representing himself in a lawsuit accusing them of keeping too much of his settlement money. He asked for the case to be dismissed a month later.
Smith said he became dependent on the firm for income and, sometimes, shelter. In the summer of 2022, Smith moved into a downtown building where he paid rent to Yaghoubtil’s uncle, according to text messages between the two men. The handwritten lease, rife with misspellings, said he could stay there until he “seatel his case whit Dawntow Law Group.”
Smith said he made monthly trips to pick up checks from DTLA, which was providing him money for his rent, bills, food and car repairs, according to loan statements and text messages between the two men.
Smith said he flitted in and out of homelessness during that time — his first time ever without stable housing.
“When I met you I had my own everything,” Smith texted Yaghoubtil July 18, 2022 “Now I don’t even have clothes.”
Listed in Smith’s phone as “Farid Ferrari,” Yaghoubtil replied, “What happened to the money you got?”
Landlords, landfills and ‘incentives in exchange for signatures’
Downtown LA Law Group, founded in 2016, is run by three longtime friends.
Yaghoubtil, 42, is cousins with founding partner Daniel Azizi, 43. They met Salar Hendizadeh, 44, in elementary school, according to an interview they did with a commercial real estate company.
All attended Beverly Hills High School together, yearbooks show.
Hendizadeh left the firm in October, according to a letter sent to staff this month. The note did not explain why but said Hendizadeh “cannot be conducting any firm related business.” He did not respond to an inquiry from The Times.
Many clients who spoke to The Times said that among the partners, Yaghoubtil in particular vied hard to get their business.
In January 2019, William Brighton, who was in the VA hospital recovering from a car accident, asked a judge for a restraining order against Yaghoubtil, accusing him of making “numerous visits at the hospital to coerce (and bribe) me to retain them as counsel.”
He said Yaghoubtil offered him $1,000 to switch from his current law firm, according to the request for a restraining order. Brighton later asked a judge to dismiss the case.
DTLA did not address questions about the restraining order request.
The firm expanded quickly, outgrowing four different offices before landing this year in a 52,000-square-foot headquarters in the Arts District. They moved beyond their bread-and-butter fare of personal injury, adding departments for mass torts — cases that involves thousands of people suing over the same thing — and housing law.
An empty plot of land where the DTLA partners used to own an apartment building across the street from their East Hollywood office. Multiple tenants sued the partners for living conditions and the building is now demolished.
(Ronaldo Bolanos / Los Angeles Times)
The trio moonlighted as landlords themselves, owning an apartment building across the street from their East Hollywood office. They were sued by several units in 2023 and 2024 over living conditions, including allegations of infestations of rats, vermin and cockroaches that tenants said made their lives “a living hell.” One of the cases settled for $2 million, according to court records.
The partners were charged in October 2024 with a misdemeanor for failing to maintain the building. The case was dismissed and the building is now demolished.
Around 2024, their mass torts business began booming, starting with the landfill lawsuits, in which the firm accused the operators of recklessly allowing nauseating odors.
Heather Stone said she saw representatives of DTLA looking for people for landfill cases outside a Santa Clarita Walmart in 2024, one of two residents who told The Times they saw representatives at the store who appeared to be recruiting clients.
Castaic’s Chiquita Canyon Landfill, which residents say emits noxious odors, is the subject of a flood of lawsuits brought by DTLA.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
Banna said in an interview that she later learned some clients for the landfill cases had been receiving gift cards to sign petitions at box stores in the area and those names later appeared on signed retainers even though clients were adamant they never signed up for a lawsuit. She accused the firm in her lawsuit of “providing gift cards, money gifts, and similar incentives in exchange for signatures.”
The firm said in a statement it would be impossible for someone to believe they were signing a petition when they were signing up for a lawsuit due to the large number of documents required to come on board.
“If someone made that claim, we would certainly discontinue our services at their request,” the firm said.
A former DTLA case manager, who asked to remain anonymous, fearing professional repercussions, said the alleged recruitment effort became clear to him after he was assigned to call people from a list he’d been provided of new Chiquita Canyon clients and found several who believed they had signed up for a petition, not a case.
“A lot of these people were completely unaware of what they were signing up for,” the former case manager said.
Surgeries and promises of ‘lottery money’
Three former case managers, who worked as liaisons between clients and attorneys, described the same modus operandi at DTLA: Sign up personal injury clients, then get them to agree to surgeries.
The more surgeries, they were told, the more profit, as it would make the case more valuable by allowing lawyers to claim higher medical damages.
The case managers said partners pushed surgeries and would give bonuses when clients went under the knife. Doctors — who stood to benefit by being able to bill for the procedures — would have gifts dropped off at the office, the ex-employees said.
The firm said any allegations of unethical practices were the result of “disgruntled former employees … who have ulterior self-serving motives.”
The case managers reported getting $500 checks from the firm when they got a client to agree to a surgery — often with the word “bonus” in the memo. The Times viewed one of these “bonus” checks, which the former employee said was for a client’s skin graft.
If they didn’t convince their clients to get surgeries, the former case managers said they feared losing their job. Yaghoubtil would ask case managers to send him a list of their surgeries at the end of the month, according to messages viewed by The Times.
“Our sx numbers for the month of May were very low,” said Yaghoubtil in a June 3 Teams message to 64 staff members, using an abbreviation for surgery. “Many were unable to produce even a single procedure… this is not acceptable.”
“How can you go an entire month and not have at least one of your cases worked up?” he continued. “It does not go un-noticed and will be letting go of those who are not trying hard enough.”
The firm said in a statement that it doesn’t interfere with a client’s medical care decisions.
“DTLA’s role is to advocate, inform, and support with transparency, compassion, and respect at every stage of the process,” the firm said.
DTLA recently moved into a new office at the former Lucky Brand headquarters in the Arts District of Los Angeles.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
Jacqueline McClelland, 60, said she was assured “lottery money” by a DTLA attorney in July 2018 after she slipped in a puddle of oil in a Willowbrook shopping plaza.
The insurer for the plaza called her up and offered her $1 million if she didn’t lawyer up, she said. But she said her DTLA attorney promised they could get her far more — as long as she went to all the doctors they recommended. She turned the insurer down.
Her case settled for $350,000.
It was not even close to enough to pay for the half-million in fees she said she’d racked up, primarily from going to doctors. She said she is still in excruciating back pain from her surgery.
DTLA took 46% of the settlement and sent the rest of the money to a judge to decide how to divvy between her and the 31 doctors, clinics and loan companies she owes, according to a court record filed on behalf of DTLA to determine the distribution. A volunteer at a Watts high school, McClelland has spent a year lawyerless in court fighting for any bit of it she can get.
“Is someone helping you?” asked Judge Gary Tanaka at a Dec. 17 hearing in his Torrance courtroom where she had been appearing with such regularity that the clerk knows her by first name.
“No one. Sorry, your honor, no one has helped me at all,” said McClelland, standing in a court proceeding she said repeatedly she did not understand. “Downtown LA Law just gave me to the wolves.”
“I would agree with that,” said Scott Meehan, an attorney representing one of the doctors fighting her for her settlement money.
DTLA said it could not comment on privileged conversations with McClelland. The firm said in a statement that all medical providers had legitimate liens that entitled them to money from the client’s settlement, including McClelland’s.
Jacqueline McClelland, a former client of DTLA, stands outside Los Angeles Superior Court in Torrance on Dec. 17 ahead of her court hearing.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
The Times found court records for more than 60 DTLA clients who had costs, typically medical bills, that ended up being more than their settlement. In those cases, DTLA couldn’t convince the doctors to reduce fees, and the attorney would hand the remaining money over to let the court decide how to divvy it up among everyone who needed to be paid.
But the lawyers get their cut — in some cases, more than three-quarters of the settlement, according to lawsuits filed on the firm’s behalf to determine who gets the remaining money.
“Our clients only pay for legal fees and costs if they win a lawsuit or get a settlement,” DTLA said in a statement.
After he was beaten by a Santa Monica security guard, David Villatoro, a 33-year-old construction worker, said a DTLA attorney told him he could get half a million easy, probably double that. But only if he went to a litany of doctors’ appointments, including a neck surgery.
It would mean losing his construction job and going on disability. But he claims his attorney said the surgery would make the case more valuable.
“That’s where the big bucks come in,” he recalled the attorney saying.
The big bucks never came.
Instead, months after the case settled, Villatoro got an email telling him not to contact the firm anymore about his case. Attorneys had taken 58% of his settlement money — about $72,000 — and he would have to go to court to fight for a cut of what was left along with the doctors.
He said he still can’t turn his head fully to the right.
“I’m just so confused,” he said. “I was so naive. It was my first time ever, ever, ever getting a lawyer.”
Laura Stephenson, a 57-year-old baker, was told by her DTLA attorney that her slip-and-fall in her Menifee cul-de-sac could net millions. But she would need to do a shoulder surgery.
She hesitated. It would mean too much time away from her bakery and she wasn’t sure she wanted to do it. The attorney convinced her by offering her a loan for $10,000, she said.
More than four years after the fall, she has received no money and can’t fully move her arm. The firm took 77% of her $175,000 settlement, according to a court filing to decide how to distribute the money. The rest went to the court to distribute, and she is still fighting to get a portion.
“I am living this nightmare,” said Stephenson, one of eight people The Times spoke with who said they filed a complaint with the State Bar.
The firm said all medical treatment was voluntary and ethics rules prevent sharing more information about discussions with clients.
“DTLA does not force anyone to receive medical treatment they do not want,” the firm said.
Uber, a common target of DTLA, sued the firm and one of the main surgeons used by clients, Greg Khounganian, last summer for racketeering, alleging the firm had “side agreements” with him to inflate medical bills for unnecessary procedures. Uber’s lawsuit alleged that many patients underwent an unnecessary spinal fusion that takes months to recover from in order to get a larger settlement.
In some cases, Uber alleged, Khounganian inflated the bills by as much as 640%. If the case didn’t settle for much, the lawsuit stated, Khounganian would agree to dramatically reduce their liens.
In an Instagram post, DTLA called the lawsuit a “calculated attempt by a billion-dollar corporation” to suppress legitimate claims. An attorney representing Khounganian said the doctor had a spotless professional record and had never faced any disciplinary action.
“He is assuredly a first-rate and widely respected orthopedic surgeon,” Stephen Larson, an attorney for Khounganian, said in a statement. “Uber’s meritless lawsuit, we believe, is part of its nationwide political and lawfare campaign to suppress liability for accidents caused by Uber’s drivers.”
Khounganian sought to have Uber’s case against him dismissed, with his attorneys calling it in one court filing “a lawsuit designed purely for tabloid effect with no meaningful effort at substance.”
One person, who saw another doctor for a heart valve condition that heightened the risk of complications, could no longer walk for more than 10 minutes after their surgery, Uber alleged in the lawsuit.
DTLA clients said the firm would often insist on sending them to specific L.A. doctors even if they lived in a different county, or, in some cases, a different state.
Christy Strickland, who had a case over a fall that occurred while working for the delivery app Instacart, said the firm insisted L.A. doctors were cheaper than those in Texas. So she said they flew her in from Houston and once gave her gas money to drive, putting her up in a hotel for two weeks to recuperate along with two of her children.
Those travel expenses would total more than $10,000 — including two $482 Uber rides, according to a breakdown. She said she was never told those travel costs would be coming out of her money.
“YOU AND YOUR DOCTOR advised me to get these surgeries and I have told you that I am still in pain even more since the surgery,” she emailed Yaghoubtil in July 2023. “Do you know how it feels to wake up in the morning and your back hurts so bad all you can do is just lay there until it subsides?”
In November, Yaghoubtil, speaking on a podcast episode called “Lawyering With Empathy,” emphasized his focus was never high-dollar verdicts. The well-being of clients, he said, always came before profit.
“We love a client,” he said. “If we have to, we’ll go down fighting with them.”
Times staff writer Christopher Buchanan contributed reporting.
Fourteen countries, including France, Britain, Canada,Germany and Japan, condemned on Wednesday Israel’s recent decision to approve new Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank. They called on the Israeli government to reverse the decision and to stop expanding settlements.
In a joint statement published by the French Foreign Ministry, the countries said: “We, States of Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Iceland, Ireland, Japan, Malta, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain and the United Kingdom condemn the approval by the Israeli security cabinet of 19 new settlements in the occupied West Bank.”
The statement added: “We recall our clear opposition to any form of annexation and to the expansion of settlement policies.”
Earlier, the Israeli government’s security cabinet approved the establishment of 19 new settlements in the occupied West Bank. This brings the total number of settlements approved over the past three years to 69.
The Israeli security cabinet has approved 19 new settlement outposts in the occupied West Bank as the right-wing government headed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu moves to prevent the formation of a viable Palestinian state.
As Netanyahu’s government has made the annexation of occupied Palestinian territory a priority, the United Nations has said Israeli settlement expansions in 2025 have reached their highest level since 2017.
“These figures represent a sharp increase compared to previous years,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said, noting an average of 12,815 housing units were added annually from 2017 to 2022.
Under the current far-right government, the number of settlement and outposts in the West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem has risen by nearly 50 percent – from 141 in 2022 to 210 now. An outpost is built without government authorisation while a settlement is authorised by the Israeli government.
Nearly 10 percent of Israel’s Jewish population of 7.7 million people lives in these settlements, which are considered illegal under international law.
Here’s everything you need to know about the newly approved settlements and what they mean for the future of Palestinian statehood.
(Al Jazeera)
Where are the new settlements?
The new settlements are spread across the West Bank – home to more than three million Palestinians – from Jenin in the north to Hebron in the south.
Most of them are close to the densely populated Palestinian villages of Duma, Jalud, Qusra and al-Lubban Asharqiya in the Nablus governorate and Sinjil in the Ramallah and el-Bireh governorate, according to Peace Now, an antisettlement watchdog group based in Israel. Other locations identified by the watchdog for the new settlement areas are in the northwestern West Bank, in the Salfit governorate, near the Palestinian towns of Sa’ir and Beit Sahour, and other areas near Bethlehem and in the Jericho governorate.
Israel’s construction spree is entrenching the occupation and squeezing Palestinians out of their homeland. Settlements dot the West Bank and are often connected by Israeli-only highways while Palestinians face roadblocks and security checks, making their daily commutes harrowing experiences.
Israel has also built Separation Barrier that stretches for more than 700km (435 miles) through the West Bank restricting movement of Palestinians. Israel says the wall is for security purposes.
Under a dual legal system, Palestinians are tried in Israel’s military courts while crimes committed by settlers are referred to a civilian court.
Israel’s latest approval also includes settlements in Ganim and Kadim, two of the four West Bank settlements east of Jenin that were dismantled as part of Israel’s 2005 disengagement plan, a unilateral withdrawal ordered by then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
Five of the 19 settlements already existed but had not previously been granted legal status under Israeli law, according to a statement from the office of Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich.
Israel controls most of the West Bank and East Jerusalem, territory Palestinians want to be part of a future state along with Gaza. Israel captured East Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in a 1967 war. It later annexed East Jerusalem, which Palestinians see as their future capital.
Israeli settlements and outposts are Jewish-only communities built on Palestinian land and they can range in size from a single dwelling to a collection of high-rises. About 700,000 settlers live in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, according to Peace Now.
The latest approval comes at a time when the United States has been working with Israel and Arab allies to move the Gaza ceasefire into a second phase. After a meeting on Friday of top officials from the US, Egypt, Turkiye and Qatar in the US city of Miami, Florida, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan accused Israel of committing repeated violations of the ceasefire that began in October.
Israel still controls nearly half of Gaza’s territory since a ceasefire was announced on October 10 after more than two years of a genocidal war killed more than 70,000 Palestinians.
Palestinian farmers, left, scuffle with Israeli settlers during the olive harvest in the Palestinian village of Silwad,near Ramallah in the Israeli-occupied West Bank on October 29, 2025 [AFP]
Has settlement construction spiked in recent years?
The new settlements bring the total number approved over the past three years to 69, according to a statement from the office of Smotrich, who is a vocal proponent of settlement expansion and a settler himself.
In May, Israel approved 22 new settlements in the West Bank, the biggest expansion in decades.
The UN chief has condemned what he described as Israel’s “relentless” expansion of settlements in occupied Palestinian territory. It “continues to fuel tensions, impede access by Palestinians to their land and threaten the viability of a fully independent, democratic, contiguous and sovereign Palestinian state”, Guterres said this month.
Palestinians have also been facing increasing settler violence since Israel’s war on Gaza began.
According to data from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), settlers have attacked Palestinians nearly 3,000 times over the past two years.
Settler attacks often escalate during the olive harvest from September to November, a vital time of year that provides a key source of income for many Palestinian families.
Settlers are often armed and frequently accompanied or protected by Israeli soldiers. In addition to destroying Palestinian property, they have carried out arson attacks and killed Palestinian residents.
Every West Bank governorate has faced settler attacks over the past two years, data from OCHA shows.
(Al Jazeera)
Are the settlements legal under international law?
No. The UN, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and the International Committee of the Red Cross all consider Israeli settlements as a violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which outlaws settler activity.
In a landmark judgement in July 2024, the ICJ, the UN’s top court, found that Israel’s occupation, settlement activity and annexation measures are illegal. In its nonbinding advisory opinion, the ICJ ruled that Israel’s continued presence in occupied Palestinian territory is unlawful and should come to an end “as rapidly as possible”.
The judges pointed to a wide list of policies – including the building and expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, use of the area’s natural resources, the annexation and imposition of permanent control over lands and discriminatory policies against Palestinians – all of which it said violated international law.
Two months later, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution demanding that Israel end its occupation of Palestinian territory within a year.
But Israel has defied the resolution by the global body backed by its ally – the United States. Washington has extended diplomatic cover to Israel against numerous UN resolutions.
Palestinians harvest olives near the occupied West Bank village of Turmus Aya near Ramallah on October 19, 2025 [Hazem Bader/AFP]
Since returning to power in January, US President Donald Trump has adopted a permissive stance towards Israeli settlement activity, breaking with longstanding US policy.
In 2019, he said Israeli settlements in the West Bank were not inherently illegal under international law. Trump also revoked his predecessor President Joe Biden’s sanctions on several settlers and groups accused of perpetrating violence against Palestinians in the West Bank.
US sanctions on settlers under Biden came under Washington’s long-held policy that settlements are the biggest impediments to the two-state solution to the conflict.
However, Trump and his officials have repeatedly said Israel cannot annex the West Bank. “It won’t happen because I gave my word to the Arab countries,” Trump told Time magazine in October. “Israel would lose all of its support from the United States if that happened.”
Israelis walk past soldiers standing guard during a weekly settlers tour in Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank on December 13, 2025 [Mussa Qawasma/Reuters]
What will the new settlements mean for the future of a Palestinian state?
The growing settlements – together with other projects undertaken by Netanyahu’s government like the E1 settlement plan that will split the West Bank – are further squeezing Palestinians in occupied territory.
Settlement expansions have drawn criticism from the international community, including Israel’s European allies, who said the steps undermine prospects for a two-state solution.
But Netanyahu and his far-right cabinet, including Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, have doubled down on their rhetoric against a Palestinian state.
“On the ground, we are blocking the establishment of a Palestinian terror state,” Smotrich said in his statement on Sunday.
In June, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and Norway slapped sanctions on Smotrich and Ben-Gvir for inciting violence.
Several European nations, including the UK and France, as well as Australia recognised Palestinian statehood in September in a push for the two-state solution.
Israel condemned the move, and Netanyahu said he won’t allow a Palestinian state. He has previously boasted how he scuttled the 1993 and 1995 Oslo peace accords by boosting settlement expansion in occupied territory.
“It’s not going to happen. There will be no Palestinian state to the west of the Jordan River,” Netanyahu said in an address in September. “For years, I have prevented the creation of that terror state against tremendous pressure, both domestic and from abroad.”
The family of pitcher Tyler Skaggs and the Angels reached a settlement Friday, ending a contentious trial as jurors had begun a third day of deliberations regarding Skaggs’ drug-related death on the road with the team. Terms of the agreement, which followed 31 days of testimony and four years of legal wrangling, were not immediately available.
Jury foreman Richard Chung said after the settlement was announced that the panel had agreed to award Skaggs’ family roughly $100 million when they were told to cease deliberations — $60 million to $80 million for economic damages, $5 million to $15 million for emotional distress damages and $10 million to $20 million for punitive damages.
Rusty Hardin, the Skaggs family’s lead attorney, told The Times that although he could not reveal the amount of the agreement, “the Skaggs family is extremely happy with the settlement.”
Early efforts to settle the case had been unsuccessful, with the Angels’ legal team and its insurance carriers rebuffing overtures from the lawyers representing Tyler Skaggs’ widow Carli Skaggs and parents Debbie Hetman and Darrell Skaggs. As recently as Tuesday evening, after the jury had begun deliberations, the lead attorneys from each side met but gained little traction toward a settlement.
The equation changed Wednesday when jurors asked the judge to read back testimony from experts on Skaggs’ future earnings had he lived. The request suggested that that the jury had determined the Angels were responsible for at least a percentage of economic damages. The jury also asked whether it was charged with determining the amount of punitive damages, adding to speculation that it might hand the Skaggs family an award beyond economic and emotional distress damage.
Roughly 95% of civil suits nationwide reach a settlement ahead of or during trial. Plaintiffs and defendants alike overwhelmingly prefer to eliminate the risk of an all-or-nothing jury verdict by agreeing on a compromise dollar figure.
Attorney Rusty Hardin, center, addresses the media Friday on behalf of the Skaggs family after a settlement was reached in their wrongful death lawsuit against the Angels.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
Sources on the Skaggs family legal team said they were amenable to a settlement to eliminate the chance of the jury determining the Angels weren’t responsible for Skaggs’ death and denying any award. Also, while either side could have appealed a jury verdict, the settlement ended the case.
Carli Skaggs and Hetman hugged their lawyers and each other when Judge H. Shaina Colover announced that a settlement had been reached and jurors were excused.
“The Skaggs family has reached a confidential settlement with Angels Baseball that brings to a close a difficult six-year process, allowing our families to focus on healing,” the family said in a statement. “We are deeply grateful to the members of this jury, and to our legal team. Their engagement and focus gave us faith, and now we have finality.
“This trial exposed the truth and we hope Major League Baseball will now do its part in holding the Angels accountable. While nothing can bring Tyler back, we will continue to honor his memory.”
MLB declined to comment on the settlement.
A jury verdict favoring the Angels also would have meant the high-powered Skaggs legal team that has spent thousands of hours on the case wouldn’t have been paid. Their contingency fee — typically at least 40% of an award — would have been zero.
Skaggs died July 1, 2019, during an Angels road trip in Texas after snorting an illicit pain pill that was laced with fentanyl.
The pill was given to Skaggs by Angels communications director Eric Kay, who is serving 22 years in federal prison for his role in the pitcher’s death. Skaggs was discovered in his Southlake, Texas, hotel room the next morning, and an autopsy concluded he accidentally died of asphyxia after aspirating his own vomit.
“The death of Tyler Skaggs remains a tragedy, and this trial sheds light on the dangers of opioid use and the devastating effects it can have,” the Angels said Friday in a statement.
Each juror had to fill out a 26-question verdict form during deliberations. The first batch of questions focused on Kay, asking jurors whether the Angels were negligent in their supervision of him, whether the team knew he was distributing illicit pills and whether he was operating within the scope of his employment when he did so.
Carli Skaggs, Tyler Skaggs’ widow, with attorney Rusty Hardin in court Friday in Santa Ana.
(Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times)
If jurors answered “yes” to any of those questions, they were then asked whether the Angels’ negligence and Kay’s “unfitness or incompetence” were substantial factors in the death of Skaggs, as well as harm to his iPad.
Consideration of the iPad, which Skaggs used as a surface to chop up drugs, was related solely to punitive damages.
The first damages the jury considered were economic. Experts for the Skaggs family lawyers testified that he would have made an estimated $102 million had he lived and continued to pitch. Experts for the Angels said his earnings wouldn’t have been more than $30 million.
During closing statements, Skaggs family attorney Daniel Dutko suggested that the Angels were 70 to 90 percent responsible for his death, and that Kay and Skaggs could each be assigned about 10 percent of the blame. Angels attorney Todd Theodora did not suggest a specific percentage, but conceded the jury might find Kay partially responsible for Skaggs’ death.
Also during closing statements, Dutko and Theodora each walked the jury through the nine-page verdict form, suggesting how questions should be answered based on testimony that supported their arguments. While criminal cases require a burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt, civil cases require only a preponderance of the evidence. At least nine of the 12 jurors are required to agree on a verdict.
Dutko said the Angels for years were negligent in dealing with Kay, a team employee since 1996 whose illicit opioid use became apparent as early as 2009, according to testimony. Evidence showed the Angels concealed Kay’s addiction rather than follow team and Major League Baseball policies in reporting it and punishing Kay, Dutko told the jury.
“Is that reasonable, is that how we want companies in our country to run?” Dutko said. “They didn’t monitor anything. They didn’t do anything.”
“There is no doubt that if Eric Kay wasn’t employed by the Angels, if he wasn’t in that clubhouse, Tyler Skaggs would be alive.”
Kay entered outpatient rehab for substance abuse in the spring of 2019 and returned to work just weeks before he was sent with the Angels to Texas. Skaggs quickly texted Kay asking for oxycodone pills. Theodora argued that the messages showed Skaggs was an uncontrollable addict who had little regard for Kay’s well-being.
Theodora showed the jury a pyramid-shaped graphic with Skaggs at the top and players who evidence had shown were given opioids by Skaggs under him, and argued that Skaggs was as complicit in distributing the drugs as Kay.
The Angels attorney told the jury that the plaintiffs’ stance that Kay should have been fired applied to Skaggs as well. “What you see here is a classic double standard,” Theodora said.
Dutko delivered a rebuttal to Theodora’s closing statement, returning to the theme that the Angels never took any responsibility for Skaggs’ death and told jurors that they can make that clear by reaching a verdict in favor of his wife and parents.
“The only reason Tyler Skaggs is dead is the Angels,” Dutko said. “We have fought for Tyler Skaggs and I will continue to fight for Tyler Skaggs as long as I’m alive. I need you to fight for him, please.”
The jury was close to a verdict that would have favored Skaggs’ family. Chung said the panel was discussing apportionment of responsibility and would have been done by the noon lunch break had they not been told to cease deliberations around 9:30 a.m.
He said his own determination was that the Angels bore 50% of the responsibility for Skaggs’ death while Kay was responsible for 35% and Skaggs for 15%.
“Ultimately, we felt the Angels needed to know that they were at fault,” Chung said. “Just to say, ‘Do better.’ They needed to do better.”
Dec. 16 (UPI) — Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison announced Tuesday a bipartisan settlement between 35 states and automakers Hyundai and Kia over selling millions of vehicles without standard anti-theft technology.
Hyundai and Kia’s alleged omission of standard security technology fueled a surge of car thefts, enabled further crime and caused deaths nationwide, including in Minnesota, Ellison’s office announced.
“Maintaining public safety means holding people who commit crimes accountable, but it also means holding corporations accountable when their greed helps criminals harm the people of Minnesota,” Ellison said in a statement.
A 2015 report found that just 26% of Kia and Hyundai cars sold in the U.S. had engine immobilizers, while other makers averaged 96%.
Under the settlement, Hyundai and Kia will give eligible owners free ignition cylinder protectors, add engine immobilizers to all future U.S. vehicles and provide up to $4.5 million in restitution for theft damages.
In addition, they will pay another $4.5 million to cover state investigation costs.
The settlement concludes Minnesota’s March 2023 investigation into Kia and Hyundai for knowingly omitting standard anti-theft tech from their manufactured cars.
Minnesota’s chief law enforcement official stated that Hyundai and Kia “unleashed a wave of auto thefts that cost Minnesotans their cars, their hard-earned money, and sometimes even their lives.”
“In short, they put their profits ahead of people’s safety,” he added.
The multi-state legal effort included Arizona, Colorado, the District of Columbia, Georgia, Hawaii, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Vermont and Wisconsin.
Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown said in a statement that Tuesday’s settlement revelation “should prevent these thefts from continuing and provides additional relief” to victimized consumers.
In 2022, Minneapolis saw Kia and Hyundai thefts linked to a slew of violent crimes and hundreds of crashes, in addition to New York and multiple states.
On Tuesday, Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara said the manufacturer’s “lack of urgency and their desire to save money inexcusably prolonged this crisis.”
“Now, the companies must take measures to protect their vehicles from theft,” New York Attorney General Letitia James posted on X.
Meanwhile, consumers who had or were scheduled for software updates but still experienced theft or attempted theft on or after April may file a claim for related expenses.
