Court Intrigue for Dickie Scruggs: Clash between trial lawyers and corporate America

[DeepModem Mom]

NYT: Court Intrigue for the King of Torts
By NELSON D. SCHWARTZ
Published: December 9, 2007


(Cheryl Gerber/NYT)
Richard Scruggs, known for bringing big companies to heel, now has to fight federal bribery charges. He is shown in a house in Pascagoula, Miss., where he has represented victims of Hurricane Katrina.

EVER since Richard Scruggs was indicted on federal conspiracy and bribery charges about two weeks ago, legal eagles have asked whether a renowned lawyer who earned a reputation as the “King of Torts” would really risk his reputation, his freedom, his wealth and, of course, his career, by offering $50,000 to sway a judge in a relatively small squabble over fees....(Charles M. Merkel, Jr., a Clarksdale lawyer) and prosecutors say that the (Alwyn) Luckey case foreshadowed some of Mr. Scruggs’ woes in the current bribery case. “As far as whether he’s guilty, I can’t say,” Mr. Merkel concedes. “But I’m not surprised, because he’s willing to use any means to an end. And it irks the hell out of me when Scruggs skates on the edge and makes the profession look bad.”...The case is also likely to fuel further debate over the merits of lucrative class-action lawsuits.

Even if Mr. Merkel turns out to be wrong, the indictment casts a different kind of spotlight on Mr. Scruggs, who cultivated the image of a smooth Southern lawyer capable of winning huge verdicts on behalf of smokers and, most recently, victims of Hurricane Katrina. Indeed, Mr. Scruggs was a key character in “The Insider,” the 1999 film that detailed how he helped win a $248 billion settlement from the tobacco industry. Estimates of how much Mr. Scruggs and his partners stand to eventually collect from the tobacco settlement reach north of $1 billion. He is one of Mississippi’s richest men, with a black Porsche Cayenne that is a familiar sight in Courthouse Square in nearby Oxford, where his firm is located....

***

WITH its Southern-fried dialogue, country lawyers and charges of small-town malfeasance, the indictment of Dickie Scruggs has all the trappings of a pulp fiction novel. Yet the case has ramifications far beyond Mississippi. It comes at a crucial time in the long-running clash between trial lawyers and corporate America over class-action lawsuits. Corporations have long sought to limit such cases and, at a minimum, put a cap on the settlements, which can be billions of dollars. Tort reform is likely to be an issue in the coming presidential election; the Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards has been criticized over his record as a trial lawyer before entering politics....

In October, another top trial lawyer, William S. Lerach, pleaded guilty to a federal conspiracy charge, and his former firm, Millberg Weiss, has been charged with paying witnesses to join their class-action lawsuits....

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Advocates for trial lawyers argue that the plaintiffs’ bar helps keep corporations honest. “Americans know that insurance companies, drug makers, banks and other powerful corporations should treat them fairly — and they know they don’t,” said Kathleen Flynn Peterson, president of the American Association for Justice, which represents trial lawyers....These broader legal disputes are likely to echo loudly in Mississippi when the Scruggs case comes to trial. Already, Mr. Scruggs’s lawyers are privately suggesting he was singled out for prosecution because of his success suing big companies, while saying that with pro-business Republicans running the White House, the Justice Department and the local federal prosecutor’s office, trial lawyers like Mr. Scruggs are tempting targets.

Mr. Scruggs has been a major political donor, especially to the Democratic Party. Although he has given to some Republican candidates and is a brother-in-law of Senator Trent Lott, Republican of Mississippi, Mr. Scruggs recently contributed $300,000 to Democracy for America, an independent group that supports liberal political candidates....

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/09/business/09scruggs.html?ref=todayspaper&pagewanted=all


(Rollin Riggs/NYT)
The Scruggs law offices in Oxford, Miss. The state’s bar is known for its interconnecting relationships and rivalries.

[flashl]

1. Its about Katrina class-action money

MS Lawyers and Katrina Lawsuit

[DeepModem Mom]

2. Thanks for this additional info, flashl! nt