‘Take Care of Maya’ Family Battles Lawyers Over Litigation Loan

A family at the center of a Netflix documentary about the treatment of a child with a rare chronic illness is battling their former attorneys over proceeds from a $42 million litigation funding loan.

Jack Kowalski and his daughter Maya are trying to stop AndersonGlenn LLP of Jacksonville, Florida from collecting nearly $10 million in an attorneys fee from loan funds the family secured.

The lawyers “committed flagrant, serious, and repeated violations of their professional, ethical, and fiduciary duties during their representation of the Kowalskis,” the family’s counsel argues in a brief filed earlier this year in the Twelfth Judicial Circuit Court in Florida.

The case offers a peek behind the curtain at post-judgment litigation finance deals, in which investors advance money on pending awards with the hope of getting a return at the end of an appeals process. The incident at the center of the case was chronicled in the 2023 Netflix documentary, “Take Care of Maya.”

Maya, then 9, was diagnosed in 2015 with Complex Regional Pain Syndrome, according to the complaint. She was sheltered at Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital in St. Petersburg, Florida for over three months while authorities investigated possible medical child abuse by her mother, Beata Kowalski.

During Maya’s stay, Beata Kowalski died by suicide. That led to a legal battle between the family and the hospital in the Twelfth Judicial Circuit Court in Florida. The court awarded the family a judgment of over $200 million in 2023.

The Kowalskis after the legal victory took out the $42 million loan as a way to tap into some of the proceeds while they awaited payment after appeals. HPS Investment Partners, a global credit investment manager acquired by BlackRock in 2025, provided the family with the loan.

To secure the $42 million loan, the Kowalskis took out a $60 million judgment preservation insurance policy provided by Ambridge Group and brokered by Willis Towers Watson, according to court documents. Such policies guarantee at least a portion of a judgment that has been awarded but not yet paid out.

In October 2025, the Second District Court of Appeal reversed the more than $200 million judgment and remanded the case for a new trial, increasing the risk that the insurer will have to pay out on the policy.

Meanwhile, the Kowalskis’ lawyers in the original dispute targeted a piece of the $42 million in loan proceeds for payment for their work in the case. The Kowalski family then filed a separate lawsuit against AndersonGlenn’s effort for the $10 million fee in the Twelfth Judicial Circuit Court in Florida.

The family claims the law firm is entitled to nothing because its contingency fee was too high under state bar rules and because the loan proceeds aren’t considered a recovery. The law firm’s fee was 40 percent of any recovery up to $1 million, and an additional 33 percent above $1 million. AndersonGlenn, however, argues that the Kowalskis are trying to keep the loan proceeds while paying their lawyers nothing.

“There were 4,600 docket entries, your average complex legal malpractice case has maybe 300,” said Greg Anderson, founder of AndersonGlenn, in a statement. “No one has ever in history had a case like that. No one else would take the case.”

Judge Hunter Carroll ruled in May that the loan constitutes proceeds of a judgment. He also ordered an evidentiary hearing to determine if the contingency fee was excessive and if AndersonGlenn violated ethics rules by providing improper financial assistance to the Kowalskis.

Representatives for the family and Willis Towers Watson declined to comment. HPS declined to comment. Ambridge did not respond to a request for comment.

Jack Kowalski v. Johns Hopkins All Childrens Hospital Inc, Fla. Cir. Ct., 2018 CA 005321 NC