Copyright © Ric Dexter 1992
In 1991, while I was a legal videographer and trial presentation specialist, a trial was called in a case where a chemical company had sued an insurance company. I was hired to help in that trial. I wrote this, to the tune of Alice’s Restaurant, during that trial.
You can learn about
complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
You can learn about
complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
They say havin’ so much
fun’s a sin
but I’ll take a complex
case again
You can learn about
complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
I wanna tell you a story and it’s a story about
complex litigation
Now some people think that litigation is complex as soon as you have more than one attorney involved in it and they may be right but if that is what you think IS complex litigation then I want you to consider a what it is when a chemical company from St. Louis sues an insurance company from New Jersey over a matter that started in Boston, and some parts of which took place in London, England, Paris, France, Houston, Texas, St. Louis, Missouri, Cherry Hill, New Jersey, Friendswood, Texas, and just about anywhere else in the world except,
in Marshall, Texas,
Where it was being tried in state court.
When it started the insurance company was being represented by counsel from New York, Chicago, and one guy who was – but then was not – but probably now is the partner of the one of the alleged perpetrators of the alleged evil deed. The lawyers from New York quit and then a law firm in Dallas was hired
bringing along 7 lawyers 1 paralegal and a support staff of thousands along with a lawyer from Longview, because he knew were the courthouse was, and the law firm from Chicago sued the insurance company so they were fired and another law firm from Dallas was hired
Now the chemical company, thinking ahead,
You’ll see in this story that it sometimes pays to think ahead,
sent two lawyers from St. Louis to hire one law firm from Dallas who put 6 lawyers and three paralegals on the case, and two lawyers from Marshall, because they knew where the courthouse was, and they hired a litigation scientist, a shrink.
By the time the trial started one paralegal was an independent and one lawyer was with another firm, and one lawyer was an independent courtroom presentation specialist but they all kept working on the same case and about then they hired one very confused video guy.
which is about where this story starts because
I was the very confused video guy and since I’m the one telling the story I’ll tell it from my point of view. Now I thought that I should make a movie out of it but there were too many changes and besides nobody wanted to be on tape and the judge (that’s Bonnie and it was at her door that I learned a lot about complex law which is another story and maybe we’ll get to that later but for now let’s just get back to the cast of characters and why I couldn’t make a movie) the judge wouldn’t let me bring my cameras into the courtroom.
so instead of showing you a movie I’ll just have to tell the story.
You can learn about
complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
You can learn about
complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
July setting
we’ll see summer nights
seems by August
we’ll end this fight
You can learn about
complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
I want to tell you this story so that you will know that if you are a lawyer, or if you know a lawyer, or if you use a lawyer, or even if you aren’t ,or don’t, YOU TOO could be involved in complex litigation and should prepare yourself by remembering everything you ever said, or thought, or knew, or wrote or anything anyone else you knew OR DIDN’T KNOW said or wrote, or anything they knew or thought
they might have known, or should have known or they could have thought,
because as discovery continued it turned out that everyone with any knowledge of the matter at hand was either an insurance agent or a lawyer or an insurance lawyer or an insurance agent and a lawyer, or a lawyer who worked for an insurance company.
Now, like I said in the song, this trial was set for July and was supposed to last for six weeks so I told my wife that I would not be home for dinner, or my birthday, or her birthday and I packed my equipment and my clothes, and prepared to go to east Texas and the phone rang, so I stopped.
I was advised by that phone call that the insurance company didn’t think it had enough lawyers so they hired another one but unfortunately the only qualified lawyer they could find in Texas was a state Senator and, surprise surprise, the Legislature had just been called back into special session so we would not be going to trial for another sixty days, so I unpacked my equipment and my clothes and told my wife that I would be home for dinner.
You can learn about
complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
You can learn about
complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
September Setting
we’ll see autumn nights
Maybe by Halloween
we’ll end this fight
You can learn about
complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
Now I guess because there was more time to fill they decided to fill the time with more discovery while I got the chance to look at about 4000 hours of deposition tapes.
thrilling
So I started watching the 4000 hours of deposition tapes and right then I got a call and was told to pack my equipment and my clothes to go to London and that I might be there for about a week and so I told my wife that I wouldn’t be home for dinner, or for our son’s birthday and I packed my clothes and equipment and got on a plane and when I got to London I walked in, set up my camera and the witness walked in, walked in sat down and said he wouldn’t talk with the camera there so I packed my equipment and my clothes and got on a plane and got home in time to eat yesterday’s dinner, it was cold by then.
Once again it was almost time to start the trial so I packed my clothes and my equipment and as I was on my way out the door the phone rang, so I stopped.
It seems it was time for another cast change for the insurance company,
The 7 lawyers and the thousands of support staff from the first Dallas firm had quit leaving only the paralegal, so they decided to hire a lawyer from San Francisco to fill the gap, his name was Downtown Brown,
they’d gone all the way from uptown to downtown.
Then the other firm from Dallas quit so the insurance company decided that they needed a lawyer who could relate to an East Texas jury so the bought one,
in Amarillo,
Now Bonnie wasn’t too happy with this latest change but she gave them more time to get ready for trial, anyway.
You can learn about
complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
You can learn about
complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
Trick or treat
and turkey thighs
Maybe by Christmas
we’ll end this fight
You can learn about
complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
The trial was set to start on November 4th so a week before Halloween I was in my costume and about to go out to a Halloween party with my kids and the phone rang, so I stopped.
I was needed in Marshall right away so I packed my equipment and my clothes and told my wife I would not be home for dinner, or Thanksgiving and I left,
I got there took off my costume and unpacked my equipment and my clothes and waited. We watched the World series. While I was waiting I got a chance to look around at what suddenly was the largest law firm in east Texas. There were the original six lawyers from Dallas and the two from Marshall, one of whom was “one of the 10 best trial lawyers in Texas”, the two Lawyers from St. Louis, and 5 paralegals one of which was a computer expert and executive box relocation specialist, he was probably the most important of them all because we had boxes, lots of boxes, in fact we had a file room that looked like the Library of Congress, there were rows and stacks of files and depositions and charts and graphs and visual aids and exhibits filling a room bigger than most law offices and each and every one of them was Scneiderized At 12 o clock we were all called downstairs to lunch. At first I was amazed that they served us lunch, then I decided that it must be one of those bonding things –
or maybe there just weren’t that many places to go in Marshall for lunch then I figured out that it was all a plot to keep us there so we wouldn’t take long lunch hours.
They called us down for dinner too so we wouldn’t go back to our hotel
high class place, changed names 3 times while we were there had the only bar in town, till that was closed down.
BUMMER
a couple of days later, when I finished my tour of the offices, they told me to get ready to edit the 36 hour deposition of Bradford W. Wealthy, (name changed to protect the guilty) perpetrator, down to three hours and by the time I got done it was time to pick the jury, and meet all the players.
Now we still had the six attorneys from one firm but one of them was with another firm now and one of them said he would only be there for another month before he moved to a different firm and one of them was not a lawyer anymore and the lead paralegal was an independent and we still had the 5 other paralegals two attorneys from St. Louis and the two from Marshall who knew where the courthouse was and one of whom was one of the 10 best in the nation, two secretaries, one shrink, and me.
Then there were the bad guys,
they had Amarillo Slim, Downtown Brown
A guy from Longview, to show them where the courthouse was, they had The Indian, and some guy named Frank and the guy who was but was not then – but probably is now – the partner of one of the alleged perpetrators of the alleged evil deed one Dallas paralegal and another paralegal known only as the Nubile Magenta Lipped Henna Queen. And two shrinks. The Senator it seems had withdrawn from the case, yesterday.
The next day was spent trying to find twelve good citizens and true of Marshall Texas who could be fair to both parties. It was difficult to find anyone who did not hate chemical companies, or insurance companies, so we had to find some who at least hated both of them equally, that’s why we had a shrink, and they had two, or 3.
That’s when we realized that the lawyers from Marshall knew more than where the courthouse was, they knew everyone on the jury panel,
had employed or represented half of them.
made the job more difficult
had to find twelve good and true who didn’t already hate them. We finally did. It wasn’t easy.
At the end of the day Bonnie told them that she was giving them the next week to explain to their bosses and their loved ones why they wouldn’t be home or to work for the next month or so, and to get their affairs in order. Just like they do if you’re rich after you’ve been given a long prison sentence.
Now that wasn’t the real reason she let them off for a week. You see she had some motions to consider. There were motions for recusal, motions for a change in venue, motions in liminie, motions for exclusion, motions for mistrial, motions to deny motions, motions to limit motions and motions to limit Emotions.
I’ve always wondered why they call them motions when it seems their primary purpose is to limit any sort of forward motion in the trial, cause it took that whole week and the weekend of motion before we could move forward.
The first day of trial finally came and the courthouse was full, reminded me of a scene from Inherit the Wind. I thought that Marshall must be hard up for entertainment. Then I remembered that we had a shrink, and they had two, that meant that at least 36 of the people in the gallery were shadow jurors. another 20 of them were the rest of the other guys trial team and 15 of them were from our office. Only one guy was there just to watch, he got bored and left after an hour or so.
We finally started and both sides got a chance to explain their side of the story. Now as I said this was complex litigation so we could not have a simple explanation. We didn’t have any 8 by 10 glossy photos,
that was somebody elses song,
we had 4 TV screens for our video and our laser disks and our computer animations, we had color photos that were popping up on screens all over the courtroom and on little refrigerator magnets that stuck on charts and graphs that were as big as a Volkswagen bus. There were circles and lines and arrows that were so big they wouldn’t fit on a single chart but had to go off of one and on to another, we had posters that were 3 feet by five feet – 5 feet by 6 feet – 10 feet by 20 feet – we had charts that were so big they wouldn’t fit through the door so we had to set them up in the parking across the street and bring the jury to the window to show them what we were saying and when we got done they still didn’t understand what we were talking about, but they gave us a standing ovation for bringing them a true multi-media happening.
Then the other side got up with their 27 flip charts and their colored marker pens and spent the next couple of hours confusing any of the jurors who might have begun to understand what was going on. So Bonnie told them to go home and try to figure it out, without talking to anybody, or taking notes.
Now our first witness was of course, a lawyer, I warned you about this – and after two and a half weeks of preparation we had him up for two and a half hours and then they shot at him for two and a half days, then we patched him up for an hour or so and they punched on him for another hour and then we let him go,
the score was about Oto O so we showed a videotape, lasted about 45 minutes. The jury woke up, went home.
About four days later their objections to the videotape were ready, lasted about two hours. That was so much fun we showed another one, lasted about 30 minutes, objections lasted about two hours
Our next live witness was Georgene, a sweet little lady that the other side had taken to calling “the grim reaper”. They didn’t know how prophetic that was because we finally got her up on the stand and finished our direct in a couple of hours. Then we took the rest of the day off. The next morning Amarillo Slim started to cross examine her, between sips on his “7up +” that he kept in the hall, and after about a half a day he started to lose his place, he couldn’t remember her name or why she was there or the judges name, and seemed to have trouble with why he was there. and then he had to sit down. Seems sweet little Georgene had almost killed him. He had to go home. We had a live witness and a dead lawyer.
So we had to take another week off since of their entire trial team there was not a single person who knew enough to finish her cross examination.
Now of course this week was not wasted, we had time for more motions I, told you about motions, seems they thought they deserved a mistrial because of the abuse of council by Georgene. Also gave me time to re-edit Bradford down to two and a half hours.
Since we have the time now I guess I better tell you about the people on our team. Poppa Bob was there from St. Louis, he approved all the checks. Nobody could think of anything bad to say about him, still can’t, and he brought the Snivfax now it seems that his job was to wear spandex and make sure all the money was being spent appropriately, I don’t know how you do that during the trial. Best way is to wait till it’s over. If you won it was, if you lost it wasn’t. Sam was there, Sam was like Matlock, without the money, or the TV show, or the hair. Used to be the judge in this very court, now you know why picking a jury was so hard, and so was Carl, one of the 10, no now it was 9 best trial lawyers in the Universe. They were both from Marshall and it was to Donna and Joann and their staff that we owed thanks for each of us putting on about 20 pounds during this trial.
Doctor Don was our Shrink, aside from trying to keep us all sane his job was to call all his Observers at the end of the day and find out if they understood what the trial was all about. after 3 weeks and 4 and a half witnesses only four of them did so he let the rest go.
Gaynell was the brains of the operation, so he went back to Dallas, so his secretary could tell us what to do. Steve was the author of Schneiderization, which is a filing process so complex it deserves a song of it’s own. No one would have been able to get that right if it hadn’t been for Toni keeping us all in line, and in sticky labels. Dan was in a back room and the best I could figure was that he was the expert in arcane legal facts. His wife had a baby while we were there. Leslie had to go to the Lamaze classes with her. We all counted backwards to see if he could have been home 9 months ago. Doug quit before the trial was over. Right after that they closed the bar at our hotel. Erin tried to make up for the revenue losses. Draw your own conclusions. Now we had to go to Jefferson for drinks, that’s where Jan learned to two-step, and eat canned oysters on the half-shell, and that wine does have alcohol in it.
Brian wasn’t a lawyer anymore but he stuck around to draw pictures and prepare for the next multi-media happening. The Buthman was our chief logician. I always wanted to tell him that logic is sometimes the educated man’s way to go wrong, with confidence. But he eventually proved even that old saw was wrong.
Jeff fixed computers, and moved boxes – about thirty a day to – and then from – the courtroom.
There’s more people and we’ll get back to them later for now we’ll get back to Georgene,
Twelve days later they decided to let Downtown Brown finish her cross-examination, he was younger, and besides if she killed him too it wouldn’t be that big of a loss. He had to get a haircut and quit wearing his earring though. About half-way through the second day he got done and Carl decided to politely let him know that he would not try to make him look like the opening of the nethermost bodily cavity because he had done a good enough job of that himself. Downtown took exception to this and as he was inviting Carl outside to finish their discussion Bonnie said “BOYS – STOP THAT Right NOW” and she put Carl on the Group “W” bench and he didn’t come back till Sam told him that Bonnie just meant to put him in “Time out” for an hour or so.
Downtown requested a special hearing so they could move for a mistrial. Bonnie set it for the end of the day but Downtown left. He’d forgot about the hearing. Didn’t get the mistrial that time either.
So here we were at Thanksgiving, we took one day off listened to Alice’s Restaurant on the Radio and came back. We were beginning to realize that this trial would not be over in six weeks. And neither will this song if I try to tell you everything that happened.
After 30 days we had had 10 days of trial and four witnesses. We needed to speed things up So I re edited Brad down to 2 hours. for every hour of video Steve and Eric had to deal with two and a half hours of objections. For every hour of direct we had to listen to 8 hours of cross examination. And We finally figured out the function of the Nubile Magenta lipped Henna Queen. During our direct examinations of our witnesses she would walk in and out of the courtroom distracting the Male Jurors and disgusting the female ones. We decided to fight back. Sam told Vicki to show her legs during Cross Examination. Worked great until one of the Jurors came up and asked if he could engage in some meaningful touching.
We decided we better try to rely on the facts to win (novel Idea) because it would not do for our lead paralegal to kill one of the jurors.
Amarillo Slim had a miraculous resurrection just before Christmas, He’d already been paid so he didn’t feel that he had to do much more. Bonnie said the only reason he was there was to talk hick to her. He didn’t even do much of that any more.
Then it was Christmas. We all singed up to run in the Jingle Bell Run around Marshall. Only the Snivfax and Doctor Don ran, and only one of them finished. Then we all took three days off for the holidays. I edited Brad’s tape down again, finally got it to an hour and 47 minutes so we played it. I told Steve that I didn’t want to spend that much time with one man again unless he was going to marry me.
You can learn about
complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
You can learn about
complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
New Year’s Eve and
Christmas lights
Maybe by spring we’ll
end this fight
You can learn about
complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
By the second week in January we finished our side – Jeff had moved about 900 boxes and 200 exhibits back and forth from the courtroom – we had put on about 10 live witnesses and 10 videotapes and we still weren’t sure we were winning, and by now they has 5 shrinks and one lawyer just to find grounds for appeal Fortunately there was one thing in our favor
They had to put on witnesses.
Their first witness was the guy from London who wouldn’t let me tape him. By the time he was done, he wished he had. He walked into the courtroom looking like the Pillsbury doughboy, no – bigger than that -he looked like the marshmallow man from Ghostbusters. He had re-thunk everything he had ever said and the only thing that he could still agree with was that a “waste of steam” would be covered by the policy. By the time he was done he looked like a roasted marshmallow. They had to smuggle him out of the country. And this was their strong witness.
Next they had the Hump he was poised and confident (and spoke French) Impressed ladies on the jury. He told them that most of what he said in his deposition was misinterpreted or wrong. Then he went home.
One week and three Yankees later the jury was ready for some real information. One of the alleged perpetrators of the alleged evil deed, a lawyer, was called and examined by the lawyer who was not then his partner. He clarified some of the important points of law. Like “when is an oath not an oath” Seems an oath doesn’t count when it is in a sworn statement. Seems like a good one to use, like “I pormise I’ll marry you if you will, just this once.”
Then they brought up a Lawyer who was an insurance lawyer and was also an author. Thought if he said “QED” it proved his point. Cleared things up right away, was doing a real good job for them until Sam objected because the witness was leading his counsel.
We were almost done and Jeff, you remember Jeff, always smiling, (made you think he knew the joke, and you were it) was getting ready to leave for Japan so I decided to memorialize his great effort by making a documentary of him moving boxes. and everything was going real well until Downtown Brown saw me in the Courtroom with my camera. He moved again for a mistrial, and to have me sanctioned, and castrated and decamera-ized. Bonnie (you remember Bonnie, there’s a song about Bonnie) called me into her chambers. I walked in, walked in and sat down and she looked at me and said “Have you ever been held in contempt” and I proceeded to tell her about what a great movie this would make and I could make her a star and she said “Stop it right there” and she said – “Have you ever been Sanctioned” I proceeded to tell her about how I was just trying to make a tribute to the hardest working member of our trial team and she said “Stop it right there.” She put me on the Group W bench – with Carl. Now Carl was preparing for closing so since I was already on the group W bench with him I decided to help him out. Did you know that the only time Carl sleeps is 10 minutes before he gets ready to speachify.
I was so tired the next day that I forgot that I was supposed to be there for our last multimedia happening and walked into the courtroom in my levis, no tie. I don’t think Bonnie will ever let me make this movie.
Then Brian came in in a suit and we proceeded to dazzle the jury with our laserdisks and our videos The Carl and Sam show was on the air and they explained everything, then the not partner got up and said they were wrong and Amarillo Slim got up and said that he wanted to win this case cause this was his last case and he was gonna quit lawyering. Seemed to me he already had. Months ago. Then he offered Vicki a job on his next case. She declined.
Then Bonnie gave the charge to the Jury, She said
“Kids, this piece of paper has 15 questions 3 in two parts, six in three parts, one in five parts and five in one part. Now 10 out of the 12 of you have to agree on all of the parts unless you answer the first question “NO” then you go to the 12th question and answer all 5 parts, if you answer “YES” to the first question go to the second question and answer all 3 parts and so on until you get to an answer that 10, and it has to be the same 10, out of 12 come to a yes answer and then go to the next question which doesn’t require a yes or no but asks for a number and if you can not agree on the same number but still answer yes on the previous question come to a different dollar figure and don’t add that figure to the previous figure or add the previous answer unless it is a yes or no question and talked for 15 minutes and no one understood a word she was saying but they all took the paper and had fun sitting in the jury room while all the attorneys waited outside until the jury figured they had paid them back for all the time the attorneys had made them wait from the World Series until baseball season started again, and then came out and you know
after four months of a six week trial
Justice was done.
Because as it turned out the insurance company had to pay the chemical company to do what the insurance company should have paid them for in the first place. And the only difference would have been that it would have cost less, and I would not have written this song
So why don’t we celebrate the American System of Justice by singing the words together you should know the chorus by now, the verse is
They say havin’ so much
fun’s a sin, but I’ll take a complex case again
Oh yeah, If I didn’t get around to mentioning your name tonight, it’s because you did such a professional job that I couldn’t find it in my heart, or my song to make fun of you.
so let’s all sing
You can learn about complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
You can learn about complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door
They say havin’ so much fun’s a sin
but I’ll take a complex case again
You can learn about complex law
at Bonnie’s courtroom door