§ 100B.003.Damages

A mandatory multiplied award, and the multiplier is unusually modest.

A court shall award a prevailing donee or donee's estate: 125 percent of the amount of donations the defendant collected through the fraudulent crowdfunding; and reasonable and necessary attorney's fees.

"Shall award" makes both mandatory. There is no discretion in either the multiplier or the fees.

125 percent is a restitution-plus measure rather than a punitive one. The donee receives everything the defendant collected and a quarter again — enough to remove the gain and add a margin, but not a treble-damages penalty.

Compare the malicious solicitation chapter enacted in the same session, which awards 300 percent. The difference presumably reflects that malicious solicitation exploits a declared disaster.

The measure is what the defendant collected, not what the donee lost — the same restitutionary logic as the sign trespass chapter, and for the same reason: a donee who never had the money has no conventional loss.

The mandatory fee award is what makes the claim viable. A campaign raising a few thousand dollars produces a small award, and without guaranteed fees the case would cost more than it recovers.

Subsection (b) preserves exemplary damages under the damages chapter, so a claimant may pursue them on top subject to that chapter's standards, unanimity requirement, and cap.