The King of Torts

Tequila Watson pleaded guilty to the murder of Ramon Pumphrey and was sentenced to life in prison. He would be eligible for parole in twenty years, though the story in the Post did not mention that. It did say that his victim had been one of several gunned down in a spate of killings that had seemed unusually random even for a city accustomed to senseless violence. The police had no explanations. Clay made a note to call Adelfa and see how her life was going.

He owed something to Tequila, but he wasn't sure what. Nor was there any way of compensating his ex-client. He rationalized that he had spent most of his life on drugs and would probably spend the rest behind bars anyway, with or without Tarvan, but this did little to make Clay feel honorable. He had sold out, plain and simple. He'd taken the cash and buried the truth.

Two pages over another article caught his attention and made him forget about Tequila Watson. Mr. Bennett Van Horn's pudgy face was in a photo, under his monogrammed hard hat, taken at a job site somewhere. He was intently staring at a set of plans with another man who was identified as the project engineer for BVH Group. The company had become embroiled in a nasty fight over a proposed development near the Chancellorsville battlefield, about an hour south of D.C.

Bennett, as always, was proposing one of his hideous collections of houses, condos, apartments, shops, playgrounds, tennis courts, and the obligatory pond, all within a mile of the center of the battlefield and very near the spot where General Stonewall Jackson was shot by Confederate sentries. Preservationists, lawyers, war historians, environmentalists, and the Confederate Society had drawn swords and were in the process of shredding Bennett the Bulldozer. Not surprisingly, the Post praised these groups while saying nothing good about Bennett. However, the land in question was privately owned by some aging farmers, and he appeared to have the upper hand, at least for the moment.

The article ran long with accounts of other battlefields throughout Virginia that had been paved by developers. An outfit called the Civil War Trust had taken the lead in fighting back. Its lawyer was portrayed as a radical who was unafraid to use litigation to preserve history. "But we need money to litigate," he was quoted as saying.

Two calls later and Clay had him on the phone. They talked for half an hour, and when he hung up he wrote a check for $100,000 to the Civil War Trust, Chancellorsville Litigation Fund.

Miss Glick handed him the phone message as he walked by her desk. He looked at the name twice, and was still skeptical when he sat in the conference room and punched the numbers. "Mr. Patton French," he said into the phone. The message slip said it was urgent.

"And who's calling, please?"

"Clay Carter, from D.C."

"Oh yes, he's been expecting you."

The image of such a powerful and busy lawyer as Patton French waiting for Clay's phone call was difficult to imagine. Within seconds the great man himself was on the phone. "Hello, Clay, thanks for calling me back," he said so casually Clay was caught off-guard. "Nice story in The Journal, huh? Not bad for a rookie. Look, sorry I didn't get to say hello when you were down in New Orleans." It was the same voice he'd heard from behind the microphone, but much more relaxed.

"No problem," Clay said. There were two hundred lawyers at the Circle of Barristers gathering. There had been no reason for Clay to meet Patton French, and no reason French should know Clay was even there. He had obviously done his research.

"I'd like to meet you, Clay. I think we can do some business together. I was on the Dyloft trail two months ago. You beat me to the punch, but there's a ton of money out there."

Clay had no desire to crawl into bed with Patton French. On the other hand, his methods of extracting huge settlements from drug companies were legendary. "We can talk," Clay said.

"Look, I'm headed to New York right now. What if I pick you up in D.C. and take you with me? I got a new Gulfstream 5 I'd love to show off. We'll stay in Manhattan, have a wonderful dinner tonight. Talk business. Back home late tomorrow. Whatta you say?"

"Well, I'm pretty busy." Clay vividly remembered his revulsion in New Orleans when French kept mentioning his toys in his speech. The new Gulfstream, the yacht, a castle in Scotland.

"I'll bet you are. Look, I'm busy too. Hell, we're all busy. But this could be the most profitable trip you'll ever make. I'm not taking no for an answer. I'll meet you at Reagan National in three hours. Deal?"

Other than a few phone calls and a game of racquetball that night, Clay had little to do. The office phones were ringing nonstop with frightened Dyloft users, but Clay was not fielding the calls. He hadn't been to New York in several years. "Sure, why not?" he said, as anxious to see a Gulfstream 5 as he was to eat in a great restaurant.

"Smart move, Clay. Smart move."

The private terminal at Reagan National was packed with harried executives and bureaucrats hustling through, coming and going. Near the reception counter, a cute brunette in a short skirt held a handmade placard with his name on it. He introduced himself to her. She was Julia, with no last name. "Follow me," she said with a perfect smile.

They were cleared through an exit door and driven across the ramp in a courtesy van. Dozens of Lears, Falcons, Hawkers, Challengers, and Citations were either parked or were taxiing to and from the terminal. Ramp crews carefully guided the jets past each other, their wings missing by inches. Engines screamed and the entire scene was nerve-racking.

"Where you from?" Clay asked.

"We're based out of Biloxi," Julia said. "That's where Mr. French has his main office."

"I heard him speak a couple of weeks ago in New Orleans."

"Yes, we were there. We're seldom at home."

"He puts in the hours, doesn't he?"

"About a hundred a week."

They stopped beside the largest jet on the ramp. "That's us," Julia said, and they got out of the van. A pilot grabbed Clay's overnight bag and disappeared with it.

Patton French was, of course, on the phone. He waved Clay aboard while Julia took his jacket and asked him what he wanted to drink. Just water, with lemon. His first view inside a private jet could not have been more breathtaking. The videos he had seen in New Orleans didn't do justice to the real thing.

The aroma was that of leather, very expensive leather. The seats, sofas, headrests, panels, even the tables were done in various shades of blue and tan leather. The light fixtures and knobs and gadget controls were gold-plated. The wood trim was dark and deeply polished, probably mahogany. It was a luxury suite in a five-star hotel, but with wings and engines.

Clay was an even six feet tall, and there was room to spare above his head. The cabin was long with some type of office in the rear. French was way back there, still talking into a telephone. The bar and the kitchen were just behind the cockpit. Julia emerged with his water. "Better have a seat," she said. "We're about to taxi."

When the plane began moving, French abruptly ended his conversation and charged forward. He attacked Clay with a violent handshake and toothy smile and another apology for not getting together down in New Orleans. He was a bit heavy, graying nicely with thick, wavy hair, probably fifty-five but not yet sixty. Vigor oozed from every pore and breath.

They sat across from each other at one of the tables.

"Nice ride, huh?" French said, waving his left arm at the interior.

"Pretty nice."

"You got a jet yet?"

"No." And he actually felt inadequate because he was jetless. What kind of a lawyer was he?

"It won't be long, son. You can't live without one. Julia, get me a vodka. This makes four for me, jets, not vodkas. Takes twelve pilots to keep four jets going. And five Julias. She's cute, huh?"

"She is."

"Lots of overhead, but then there's lots of fees out there. Did you hear me speak in New Orleans?"

"I did. It was very enjoyable." Clay lied a little. As obnoxious as French had been from the podium, he'd also been entertaining and informative.

"I hate to dwell on money like that, but I was playing to the crowd. Most of those guys will eventually bring me a big tort case. Gotta keep 'em pumped up, you know. I've built the hottest mass tort firm in America, and all we do is go after the big boys. When you sue companies like Ackerman Labs and any of those Fortune 500 outfits, you gotta have some ammunition, some clout. Their cash is endless. I'm just trying to level the field."

Julia brought his drink and strapped herself in for takeoff.

"You want some lunch?" French asked. "She can cook anything."

"No thanks. I'm fine."

French took a long swig of the vodka, then suddenly sat back, closed his eyes, and appeared to be praying as the Gulfstream sped down the runway and lifted off. Clay used the break to admire the airplane. It was so luxurious and richly detailed that it was almost obscene. Forty, forty-five million dollars for a private jet! And, according to the gossip among the Circle of Barristers, the Gulfstream company couldn't make them fast enough. There was a two-year backlog!

Minutes passed until they leveled off, then Julia disappeared into the kitchen. French snapped out of his meditation, took another gulp. "Is all that stuff in The Journal true?" he asked, much calmer. Clay had the quick impression that with French the mood swings were rapid and dramatic.

"They got it right."

"I've been on the front page twice, nothing ever good. No surprise that they don't like us mass tort boys. Nobody does, really, which is something you'll learn. The money takes the sting out of the negative image. You'll get used to it. We all do. I actually met your father once." His eyes squinted and darted when he talked, as if he was constantly thinking three sentences ahead.

"Really?" Clay wasn't sure he believed him.

"I was with the Justice Department twenty years ago. We were litigating over some Indian lands. The Indians brought in Jarrett Carter from D.C. and the war was over. He was very good."

"Thank you," Clay said, with immense pride.

"I gotta tell you, Clay, this Dyloft ambush of yours is a thing of beauty. And very unusual. In most cases, word of a bad drug spreads slowly as more and more patients complain. Doctors are slow as hell in communicating. They're in bed with the drug companies, so they have no incentive to raise the red flag. Plus, in most jurisdictions, the doctors get sued because they prescribed the drug in the first place. Slowly, the lawyers get involved. Uncle Luke has suddenly got blood in his urine for no reason, and after staring at it for a month or so he'll go to his doctor down in Podunk, Louisiana. And the doctor will eventually take him off whatever new miracle drug he had prescribed. Uncle Luke may or may not go see the family lawyer, usually a small-town ham-and-egger who does wills and divorces and in most cases wouldn't know a decent tort if one hit him. It takes time for these bad drugs to get discovered. What you've done is very unique."

Clay was content to nod and listen. French was content to do the talking. This was leading somewhere.

"Which tells me that you have some inside information." A pause, a brief gap in which Clay was given the opportunity to confirm that he did indeed have inside information. But he offered no clue.

"I have a vast network of lawyers and contacts from coast to coast. No one, not a single one, had heard of problems with Dyloft until a few weeks ago. I had two lawyers in my firm doing the preliminary workup on the drug, but we were nowhere close to filing suit. Next thing I see is news of your ambush and your smiling face on the front page of The Wall Street Journal. I know how the game is played, Clay, and I know you have something from the inside."

"I do. And I'll never tell anybody."

"Good. That makes me feel better. I saw your ads. We monitor such things in every market. Not bad. In fact, the fifteen-second method you're using has been proven as the most effective. Did you know that?"

"No."

"Hit 'em fast late at night, early in the morning. A quick message to scare them, then a phone number where they can get help. I've done it a thousand times. How many cases have you generated?"

"It's hard to say. They have to do the initial urinalysis. The phones have not stopped ringing."

"My ads start tomorrow. I have six people in-house who do nothing but work on advertising, can you believe that? Six full-time ad folks. And they're not cheap."

Julia appeared with two platters of food - a shrimp tray and one covered with cheeses and various meats - prosciutto, salami, and several more Clay could not name. "A bottle of that Chilean white," Pat-ton said. "It should be chilled by now.

"Do you like wine?" he asked, grabbing a shrimp by its tail.

"Some. I'm no expert."

"I adore wine. I keep a hundred bottles on this airplane." Another shrimp. "Anyway, we figure there are between fifty and a hundred thousand Dyloft cases. That sound close?"

"A hundred might be on the high side," Clay said cautiously.

"I'm a little worried about Ackerman Labs. I've sued them twice before, you know?"

"I didn't know that."

"Ten years ago, back when they had plenty of cash. They went through a couple of bad CEOs who made some bad acquisitions. Now they have ten billion in debt. Stupid stuff. Typical of the 1990s. Banks were throwing money at the blue-chips, who took it and tried to buy the world. Anyway, Ackerman is not in danger of bankruptcy or anything like that. And they've got some insurance." French was fishing here and Clay decided to take the bait.

"They have at least three hundred million in insurance," he said. "And perhaps half a billion to spend on Dyloft."

French smiled and almost drooled over this information. He could not and did not try to hide his admiration. "Great stuff, son, wonderful stuff. How good is your inside dirt?"

"Excellent. We have insiders who'll spill the beans, and we have lab reports that we're not supposed to have. Ackerman cannot get near a jury with Dyloft."

"Awesome," he said as he closed his eyes and absorbed these words. A starving lawyer with his first decent car wreck could not have been happier.

Julia was back with the wine, which she poured into two priceless small goblets. French sniffed it properly and evaluated it slowly and when he was satisfied he took a sip. He smacked his lips and nodded his head, then leaned in for more gossip. "There is a thrill in catching a big, rich, proud corporation doing something dirty that is better than sex, Clay, better than sex. It's the biggest thrill I know. You catch the greedy bastards putting out bad products that harm innocent people, and you, the lawyer, get to punish them. It's what I live for. Sure, the money is sensational, but the money comes after you've caught them. I'll never stop, regardless of how much money I make. People think I'm greedy because I could quit and go live on a beach for the rest of my life. Boring! I'd rather work a hundred hours a week trying to catch the big crooks. It's my life."

At that moment, his zeal was contagious. His face glowed with fanaticism. He exhaled heavily, then said, "You like this wine?"

"No, it tastes like kerosene," Clay said.

"You're right. Julia! Flush this! Bring us a bottle of that Meursault we picked up yesterday."

First, though, she brought a phone. "It's Muriel." French grabbed it and said, "Hello."

Julia leaned down and, almost in a whisper, said, "Muriel is the head secretary, Mother Superior. She gets through when his wives cannot."

French slapped the phone shut and said, "Let me trot out a scenario for you, Clay. And I promise you it is designed to get you more money in a shorter period of time. Much more."

"I'm listening."

"I'll end up with as many Dyloft cases as you. Now that you've opened the door, there will be hundreds of lawyers chasing these cases. We, you and I, can control the litigation if we move your lawsuit from D.C. to my backyard in Mississippi. That will terrify Ackerman Labs beyond anything you can imagine. They're worried now because you've nailed them in D.C., but they're also thinking, 'Well, he's just a rookie, never been here before, never handled a mass tort case, this is his first class action, and so on. But if we put your cases with mine, combine everything into one class action, and move it to Mississippi, then Ackerman Labs will have one, huge, massive corporate coronary."

Clay was almost dizzy with doubt and with questions. "I'm listening," was all he could manage.

"You keep your cases, I keep mine. We pool them, and as the other cases are signed up and the lawyers come on board, I'll go to the trial judge and ask him to appoint a Plaintiffs' Steering Committee. Do it all the time. I'll be the chairman. You'll be on the committee because you filed first. We'll monitor the Dyloft litigation, try and keep things organized, though with a bunch of arrogant lawyers it's hard as hell. I've done it dozens of times. The committee gives us control. We'll start negotiating with Ackerman pretty soon. I know their lawyers. If your inside dope is as strong as you say, we push hard for an early settlement."

"How early?"

"Depends on several factors. How many cases are really out there? How quickly can we sign them up? How many other lawyers jump in the fray? And, very important, how severe are the damages to our clients?"

"Not very severe. Virtually all the tumors are benign."

French absorbed this, frowning at first at the bad news, then quickly seeing the good. "Even better. Treatment is cystoscopic surgery."

"Correct. An outpatient procedure that can be done for about a thousand dollars."

"And the long-term prognosis?"

"A clean bill. Stay away from Dyloft and life returns to normal, which for some of these arthritis sufferers is not pleasant."

French sniffed his wine, swirled it in his goblet, and finally took a sip. "Much better, don't you think?"

"Yes," Clay said.

"I did a wine-tasting tour in Burgundy last year. Spent a week sniffing and spitting. Very enjoyable." Another sip as he pondered and prioritized the next three thoughts, without spitting.

"That's even better," French said. "Better for our clients, obviously, because they're not as sick as they could be. Better for us because the settlements will come faster. The key here is getting the cases.

The more cases we get, the more control we have over the class action. More cases, more fees."

"I got it."

"How much are you spending on advertising?"

"Couple of million."

"Not bad, not bad at all." French wanted to ask where, exactly, did a rookie get $2 million for advertising? But he controlled himself and let it pass.

There was a noticeable reduction in power as the nose dipped slightly. "How long to New York?" Clay asked.

"From D.C., about forty minutes. This little bird does six hundred miles an hour."

"Which airport?"

"Teterboro, it's in New Jersey. All the private jets go there."

"So that's why I haven't heard of it."

"Your jet's on the way, Clay, get ready for it. You could take away all my toys, just leave me a jet. You gotta have one."

"I'll just use yours."

"Start off with a little Lear. You can buy them all day long for a couple of million. You need two pilots, seventy-five grand each. It's just part of the overhead. Gotta have it. You'll see."

For the first time in his life, Clay was getting jet advice.

Julia removed the trays of food and said they would be landing in five minutes. Clay became entranced by the view of the Manhattan skyline to the east. French fell asleep.

They landed and taxied past a row of private terminals, where dozens of handsome jets were either parked or being serviced. "You'll see more private jets here than in any other place in the world," French explained as both looked out the windows. "All the big boys in Manhattan park their planes here. It's a forty-five-minute drive into the city. If you really have the fuzz, you have your own helicopter to take you from here to the city. That's only ten minutes."

"Do we have a helicopter?" Clay asked.

"No. But if I lived here, I would have one."

A limo fetched them on the ramp, just a few feet from where they stepped off the plane. The pilots and Julia stayed behind, tidying up and no doubt making sure the wine was chilled for the next flight.

"The Peninsula," French said to the driver.

"Yes sir, Mr. French," he replied. Was this a rented limo or one owned by Patton himself? Surely, the world's greatest mass tort lawyer wouldn't use a car service. Clay decided to let it pass. What difference did it make?

"I'm curious about your ads," French said, as they moved through the congestion of New Jersey. "When did you start running them?"

"Sunday night, in ninety markets, coast to coast."

"How are you processing them?"

"Nine people working the phones - seven paralegals, two lawyers. We took two thousand calls Monday, three thousand yesterday. Our Dyloft Web site is getting eight thousand hits each day. Assuming the usual hit ratio, that's about a thousand clients already."

"And the pool is how big?"

"Fifty to seventy-five thousand, according to my source, who so far has been pretty accurate."

"I'd like to meet your source."

"Forget it."

French cracked his knuckles and tried to accept this rejection. "We have to get these cases, Clay. My ads start tomorrow. What if we divide the country? You take the North and East, give me the South and West. It'll be easier to target smaller markets, and much easier to handle the cases. There's a guy in Miami who'll be on television within days. And there's one in California who, I promise you, is copying your ads right now. We're sharks, okay, nothing but vultures. The race is on for the courthouse, Clay. We have one helluva head start, but the stampede is coming."

"I'm doing the best I can."

"Give me your budget," French said, as if he and Clay had been in business for years.

What the hell, Clay thought. Sitting in the back of the limo together, they certainly seemed like partners. "Two million for advertising, another two million for the urinalyses."

"Here's what we'll do," French said without the slightest gap in the conversation. "Spend all your money on advertising. Get the damned cases, okay! I'll front the money for the urinalyses, all of it, and we'll make Ackerman Labs reimburse us when we settle. That's a normal part of every settlement, to make the company cover all medicals."

"The tests are three hundred dollars each."

"You're getting screwed. I'll put some technicians together and we'll do it much cheaper." Which reminded French of a story, one about the early days of Skinny Ben litigation. He converted four former Greyhound buses into traveling clinics and raced all over the country screening potential clients. Clay listened with fading interest as they crossed the George Washington Bridge. Another story followed.

Clay's suite at The Peninsula had a view of Fifth Avenue. Once he was safely locked inside, away from Patton French, he grabbed the phone and began searching for Max Pace.