The Color of Law (4 page)

Scott shook his head. Plaintiffs’ lawyers. Scott was figuring on making maybe $50 million over his career, but plaintiffs’ lawyers, those bastards make that every year, taking 33 percent, 40 percent, sometimes 50 percent of their clients’ damage awards, almost always settlements like this because a corporation can’t afford to roll the dice with a Texas jury, not when the jurors might pull another
Pennzoil v. Texaco
and come back with an $11,120,976,110.83 judgment, the largest jury verdict in the history of the world. Which made Texas a plaintiffs’ lawyers’ playground. To date, Franklin Turner, Esq., had amassed over one billion dollars in verdicts and settlements, the bastard.

“Hey, Scott, what do you think about that black halfback we got from Houston? He gonna break your records?”

Frank had been in the Mustang marching band at SMU. Tuba.

“They’ve been trying for fourteen years now, Frank. No one’s come close.”

“One day, Scott, one day.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah…Good doing business with you, Frank.”

Scott reached over with the 9-iron and hit the disconnect button on the speakerphone. A successful ten-minute negotiation, for which he felt duty bound to bill his best client $50,000. The way he figured, Tom Dibrell was prepared to pay $2 million to settle with Nadine; his lawyer had skillfully held the settlement to only $1 million; so, even with a $50,000 legal fee, he was actually
saving
Dibrell $950,000. Studying his reflection in the window, he practiced his full golf swing and held his pose like a pro. Scott Fenney had found that he possessed the necessary skills to excel at three games in life: football, golf, and lawyering.

FOUR

F
IVE O’CLOCK.
The end of another day of crisis, conflict, and confrontation. A lawyer’s life. It isn’t for everyone, or even every lawyer. Lawyering either gets into your blood, or it doesn’t. If you don’t wake up itching for a fight, if you shy away from personal confrontation, if you’re not the competitive type, if you don’t possess the intestinal fortitude to go mano a mano with a famous plaintiffs’ lawyer and beat him at his own game, then the manly sport of lawyering just isn’t for you. Go into social work.

Lawyering is a lot like football. In fact, Scott always figured his football career was the best pre-law curriculum the school offered; it certainly made the transition to the law an easy one for him. Whereas football is legalized violence, lawyering is violent legalities: lawyers use the law to pummel each other’s clients into submission. And just as football coaches want smart, mean, and tough players, rich clients want smart, mean, and tough lawyers. And they want to win. At all costs. Lie, cheat, steal, just win the goddamned case! In football and the law, winning isn’t everything; it’s the only thing. Winners reap the rewards; losers lose. A. Scott Fenney, Esq., leaned back in his chair, locked his hands behind his head, and surveyed his world here at the Ford Stevens law firm: he was a winner. And his reward was a perfect life. An absolutely perfect life.

He heard the phone ring at Sue’s desk. In seconds, she was standing in the door, purse in hand.

“Mr. Fenney, it’s the federal court.”

Scott shook his head. “I’ll call her back tomorrow.”

“It’s not the clerk. It’s the judge. Judge Buford.”

Scott snapped forward in his chair. “Judge Buford’s on the phone?”

Sue nodded.

“What the hell does he want with me?”

Sue shrugged, and Scott’s eyes fell to the single blinking light on his phone. On the other end of that line was Judge Samuel Buford, the senior judge on the federal bench for the Northern District of Texas. Appointed by Carter, he had presided over every civil rights case in Dallas for the last three decades. He was now something of an icon in conservative Dallas despite being a liberal Democrat. As a federal judge he made less than a second-year associate at Ford Stevens, but lawyers who made a million bucks a year still addressed him as “sir,” even outside his courtroom—and Scott had never spoken to him outside his courtroom. Scott took a deep breath, picked up the phone, and punched the blinking button.

“Judge Buford, sir, what a surprise.”

“Scott, how you doing, son?”

“Uh…fine, Judge. Just fine. Uh…how are you doing, sir?”

“Well, I’m not doing so good, Scott, that’s why I called you. I’ve got a big problem, and I need a top-notch lawyer to solve it. I figure you’re Tom Dibrell’s lawyer and—”

“Does this involve Tom?”

“Oh, no, Scott. It’s just that being Dibrell’s lawyer, you’re accustomed to high-profile work, and your appearances in my courtroom have always been excellent. But, most important, you have the right attitude. Listening to your speech at the bar luncheon today, I knew you were just the lawyer for the job. Scott, I can’t tell you how it made me feel, knowing there’s still someone who understands what being a lawyer is all about. So many young lawyers these days, seems all they care about is getting rich.”

“Yes, sir, it’s a crying shame, Judge.”

“You know, Scott, seeing you up there, everyone applauding you, made me recall that game of yours against Texas—damn, son, that was the best running I’ve ever seen. What did you get that day, a hundred fifty yards?”

“One hundred ninety-three, Judge. Three touchdowns. We still lost.”

“Hell of a game.”

“I didn’t know you were a big football fan, Judge.”

“I’m a Texan, born and raised, Scott, that makes me a football fan. Did you know I went to SMU?”

Scott chuckled. “Of course, I know, Judge. Every student at the law school knows about Samuel Buford—top grade point average in the history of the school, law review editor, clerk to Supreme Court Justice Douglas, Assistant Solicitor General under LBJ…”

“Whoa, son, you’re making me feel old.”

“Oh, sorry, sir.”

“You did pretty well yourself, Scott, top of your class.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“So, Scott, you up for helping out an old judge?”

“Always happy to help in any way, sir.”

Just then his mind’s peripheral vision caught a movement, like a linebacker moving in to nail him from his blind side.

“Tough job, Scott, requires a tough lawyer, a lawyer who doesn’t quit, who can handle pressure, who can take a hard hit and still get up—you proved all that on the football field. You know, Scott, pound for pound, I always figured you were the toughest player I’d ever seen, except maybe for Meredith.”

Before he was the star quarterback for the Dallas Cowboys, Don Meredith had been the star quarterback at SMU from 1957 through 1959, a country boy out of Mount Vernon, one of the greatest athletes ever produced by the State of Texas, and generally regarded as the toughest quarterback ever to play the position. Meredith was still a living legend in Dallas, although he lived in Santa Fe.

“But, Scott, this job also requires a lawyer who believes like you do, that lawyers are supposed to protect the poor and defend the innocent and fight for justice.”

“Absolutely, sir.”

Back in his playing days, when the game was on the line, Scott Fenney, number 22, always pulled out all the stops to take home a victory. Even though he wasn’t sure what he was playing for today—perhaps Buford wanted to appoint him independent counsel to investigate a high-profile political scandal, which could make Scott Fenney a very famous lawyer—his natural desire to win took over. He pulled out all the stops.

“Protecting the poor, defending the innocent, fighting for justice—that’s not just our professional duty, Judge, that’s our sacred honor.”

Shit, that sounded good! That’s a winner for sure!
Scott made a mental note to add that line to his campaign speech.

“Good to hear that, Scott. You’ve read about the McCall case, the senator’s son murdered Saturday night?”

“Yes, sir, by the hooker.”

“Yeah, black girl, twenty-four, a dozen priors for prostitution, drug possession…says she’s innocent.”

Scott chuckled. “Don’t they all?”

“This case is going to be a media circus—black prostitute accused of murdering a senator’s son, and not just any senator, mind you, but likely the next president.”

“Yeah, I wouldn’t want to be her lawyer.”

“Well, Scott, that’s why I called.”

And what the judge wanted from Scott Fenney hit him with all the force of a linebacker on a blitz.
Blindsided by a federal judge!
Sweat beads erupted from the pores on his forehead. His pulse jumped. He reached up and loosened his silk tie.

“She needs a good lawyer, Scott. She needs you.”

That’s what he had won? That’s the victory he would take home?
On the verge of panic, Scott’s sharp mind began devising ways to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

“But, Judge, what about the public defender’s office?”

“Scott, I can’t put a death penalty case in the hands of a wet-behind-the-ears PD lawyer who barely got through law school. This girl needs a real lawyer.”

“But I’m a corporate lawyer. Why not appoint a criminal defense attorney?”

“I was going to…until I heard your speech. Defense lawyers, they’re just hired guns. They don’t care about defending the innocent or fighting for justice. They just want to get paid. Not like you, Scott. And most of them only work state court; you’ve got federal court experience.”

“Why’s a murder case in federal court?”

“Clark McCall was the FERC chairman, courtesy of the senator. Murder of a federal official is a federal crime.”

“But, Judge—”

“And besides, Scott, you can make your mother proud.”

“What?”

“You can be another Atticus Finch.”

“But—”

“She has the right to counsel, and you’re it, Scott. You’re hereby appointed to represent the defendant in
United States of America versus Shawanda Jones
. Meet your client tomorrow morning. Detention hearing’s Wednesday, nine
A.M.
”

Scott was walking quickly—
hell, he was damn near running
—down the carpeted corridors of the sixty-second floor to the marble-and-mahogany staircase leading to the sixty-third floor. He bounded up the stairs and hurried past tiny offices occupied by smart young lawyers churning out their monthly quota of billable hours like blue-collar workers punching a clock on a factory line. Tonight, as every night, the workers were pulling double shifts, much to the benefit of the partners. But that thought did not fill Scott’s heart with the usual cheer; tonight his heart was filled with fear as he rushed into his senior partner’s office.

Dan Ford was sixty years old. He and Gene Stevens had founded the firm thirty-five years ago, right out of SMU law school. Dan Ford had hired Scott eleven years ago when he had graduated from SMU, taken him under his wing, taught him the profitable practice of law, got him elected to the partnership, got him the mortgage on the house, got him into the dining, athletic, and country clubs, and got him a good deal on the Ferrari. He was Scott’s mentor and father figure, and he was at his desk, his station in life from seven
A.M.
to seven
P.M.
, Monday through Friday, and from seven
A.M.
until noon on Saturdays, fifty weeks a year. Dan Ford had billed three thousand hours a year for thirty-five straight years, a feat he compared favorably to DiMaggio’s fifty-six-game hitting streak. The firm was his life.

Dan’s shiny head came up and a broad smile crossed his face.

“Scotty, my boy!”

Scott fell onto the sofa.

“You don’t look so good, son. Problem?”

Dan Ford had solved most of Scott’s problems over the last eleven years. Scott was hoping this one would be no different.

“Judge Buford just appointed me to represent the hooker who killed Senator McCall’s son.”

The news took the breath out of Dan. He fell back in his chair. “You’re joking.”

“I wish.”

“Why?”

Scott threw up his hands. “Because I gave my goddamn Atticus Finch speech at the bar luncheon! The judge was there.”

“He believed it?”

“Apparently.”

Dan ran his hands over his smooth skull.

“This is not good. Not good at all. We can’t afford to piss off the next president, and we sure as hell can’t afford to piss off Buford. Goddamn murder case, why isn’t it in state court? We could work with that!”

State court judges in Texas were always amenable to a call from a powerful partner in a big law firm because state court judges are elected on campaign contributions from big law firms. The threat of moving the firm’s contributions to the judge’s opponent in the next election has a way of keeping judges in line. Electing state court judges is a constitutional tradition in Texas dating back to 1850 and served to keep the Texas legal system orderly and predictable if not terribly fair. Thus lawyers in big law firms do not fear state court judges just as one does not fear one’s own house pet.

But federal judges were a different breed. They’re not elected. They’re appointed by the president under Article Three of the United States Constitution—for life. They can’t be voted off the bench. They don’t need campaign contributions from big law firms. They don’t fear powerful lawyers. Cross a federal judge and you live with it for thirty or forty years—you’ll never win another case in his court. A large law firm like Ford Stevens with an active federal court practice could not afford to offend Judge Sam Buford.

“We’ve got a dozen pending cases on his docket. Big-dollar cases. We become personae non gratae in Buford’s court, we lose our federal practice until the bastard dies.”

“Or retires.”

“Buford will die on the bench, just like Gene.”

Gene Stevens, the firm’s cofounder, had died at his desk last year, a pen in his hand, his hand on his daily time sheet, recording his last billable hour. Within twenty-four hours, his office had been cleaned out and Scott had moved in.

“Buford said it’ll be a media circus,” Scott said.

“Yeah, lots of publicity for the firm—all the wrong kind.” Dan’s pale face was pinking up like a newborn’s. “Goddamnit, this firm cannot defend that whore!”

Dan closed his eyes, placed his hand over his face, and rubbed his temples. His thinking mode. And when Dan Ford thought hard, he always emerged with the correct answer. Scott’s senior partner possessed a mind engineered like the Mercedes-Benz he drove: powerful, efficient, dependable, and wholly without a moral component. So Scott sat quietly while Dan’s mind worked. He turned his eyes upward and checked out the walls for new trophy kills. Dan was a big-game hunter; mounted on the walls were stuffed heads of the wild animals he had bagged over the years, all looking down on Scott. It was kind of creepy.

After a moment, Dan removed his hand. He was smiling.

“Get her to plead out.”

“She says she’s innocent, wants a trial.”

“So? Look, Scotty, go see her, explain the real likelihood the case will be lost and that she’ll be sentenced to death or best case, spend the rest of her life in prison. That by pleading out she’ll be released by the time she’s fifty and she can still have a life…You know, turn on that famous charm, pretend you care.”

“And if she doesn’t go for it?”

“She goddamn well better go for it! I’m not going to have this firm’s revenues damaged by some two-bit hooker!”

Dan’s face was now a bright red, and he was pointing a finger at Scott, a sure sign it was time to leave. Scott stood and eased toward the door.

“You tell her she’s pleading out whether she likes it or not!”

Scotty nodded and slid out. He was ten paces down the hall when he heard Dan’s voice again: “Cop a plea, Scotty!”