PART TWO. THE CAMPAIGN 18 page

But on television, she had thirty seconds. It was impossible, and the clever handlers of Ron Fisk knew it.

After a month at Pirate's Cove, Clete Coley had overstayed his welcome. The owner was fed up with giving away a penthouse suite, and he was fed up with feeding Coley's astounding appetite. The candidate was getting three meals a day, many of them sent to his room.

At the blackjack tables, he drank rum like it was water and got hammered every night. He badgered the dealers, insulted the other players, and groped the cocktail waitresses. The casino had pocketed about $20,000 from Coley, but his expenses were at least that much.

Marlin found him at the bar early one evening, having a drink and limbering up for another long night at the tables. After small talk, Marlin cut to the chase. "We'd like for you to drop out of the race," he said. "And while you're leaving, endorse Ron Fisk."

Clete's eyes narrowed. Deep wrinkles tightened around his forehead. "Say what?"

"You heard me."

"I'm not so sure I did."

"We're asking you to withdraw and endorse Fisk. It's simple."

Coley gulped the rum without taking his eyes off Marlin. "Keep talking," he said.

"There's not much to say. You're a long shot, to put it mildly. You've done a good job of stirring things up, attacking McCarthy, but it's time to bail out and help elect Fisk."

"What if I don't like Fisk?"

"I'm sure he doesn't like you. It's immaterial. The party's over. You've had your jollies, gotten some headlines, met lots of interesting folks along the way, but you've made your last speech."

"The ballots have been printed. My name is on them."

"That means that a handful of your fans won't hear the news. Big deal."

Another long pull on the rum, and Coley said, "Okay, a hundred thousand to get in, how much to get out?"

"Fifty."

He shook his head and glanced at the blackjack tables in the distance. "That's not enough."

"I'm not here to negotiate. It's fifty thousand cash. Same suitcase as before, just not as heavy."

"Sorry. My figure is a hundred."

"I'll be here tomorrow, same time, same place." And with that, Marlin disappeared.

At nine the next morning, two FBI agents banged on the door to the penthouse suite.

Eventually, Clete staggered to the door and demanded, "Who the hell is it?"

"FBI. Open up."

Clete cracked the door and peered over the chain. Twins. Dark suits. Same barber.

"What do you want?"

"We'd like to ask you some questions, and we prefer not to do it from this side of the door."

Clete opened it and waved them in. He was wearing a T-shirt and a pair of NBA-style shorts that fell to his knees and sagged halfway down his ass. As he watched them sit at the small dining table, he racked his muddled brain for some recollection of which law he'd broken. Nothing recent sprang to mind, but then nothing would at this miserable time of the day. He maneuvered his cumbersome stomach-how much weight had he gained in the last month?-into a chair and glanced at their badges.

"Does the name Mick Runyun ring a bell?" one asked.

It did, but he wasn't ready to admit anything. "Maybe."

"Meth dealer. You represented him three years ago in federal court. Pled to ten years, cooperated with the government, real nice boy."

"Oh, that Mick Runyun."

"Yes, that one. Did he pay you a fee?"

"My records are at the office in Natchez."

"Great. We have a warrant for them. Can we meet there tomorrow?"

"Love to."

"Anyway, we're betting that your records don't tell us too much about the fees paid by Mr. Runyun. We have a real good source telling us that he paid you in cash, twenty thousand bucks, and that this was never reported."

"Do tell."

"And if this is true, then it's a violation of RICO and a few other federal statutes."

"Good ole RICO. You boys wouldn't be in business without it."

"What time tomorrow?"

"I was planning on campaigning tomorrow. The election is in two weeks."

They looked at this bleary-eyed, wild-haired, hungover beast and found it comical that he was a candidate for the supreme court.

"We'll be at your office in Natchez at noon tomorrow. If you don't show| then we'll have a warrant for your arrest. That should impress the voters."

They marched out of the room and slammed the door behind them.

Late that afternoon, Marlin appeared, as promised. He ordered coffee, which he didn't touch. Clete ordered rum and soda and smelled as though it was not the first one of the day.

"Can we agree on fifty, Clete?" Marlin asked after a long spell of gazing at the cocktail waitresses scurrying about.

"I'm still thinking."

"Were those two Fibbies nice to you this morning?"

Clete absorbed this without a flinch, without the slightest twitch to indicate his surprise. In fact, he wasn't surprised at all. "Nice boys," he said. "The way I figure it, Senator Rudd is meddling again. He wants Fisk to win because they're from the same tribe. Of course we know that Rudd is the uncle of the U.S. attorney down here, a real imbecile who got the job only because of his connections. Damned sure couldn't find a job anywhere else. Rudd leans on his nephew, who brings in the FBI to twist my arm. I drop out while singing the praises of Ron Fisk, and he squeaks out a great victory. He's happy. Rudd's happy. Big business is happy. Ain't life grand?"

"You're very close," Marlin said. "And you also took a $20,000 cash fee from a drug dealer and didn't report it. Pretty stupid, but not the end of the world. Nothing that can't be fixed by The Senator. You play along now, take your cash, bow out gracefully, and you'll never hear from the Fibbies again. Case closed."

Clete's red eyes settled on Marlin's blue ones. "You swear?"

"I swear. We shake hands now, you can forget the meeting at noon tomorrow in Natchez."

"Where's the money?"

"Outside, to the right. Same green Mustang." Marlin gently laid his keys on the bar.

Clete grabbed them and disappeared.

Chapter 29

With only fifteen days left before the election, Barry Rinehart was invited to dinner at the Vietnamese hole-in-the-wall on Bleecker Street. Mr. Trudeau wanted an update.

On the flight from Boca, Barry gloated over his latest poll. Fisk was sixteen points ahead, a lead that could not be lost. The gay marriage issue had bumped him four points. The GUN attacks on McCarthy added three more. Clete Coley's rather lame farewell added another three. The campaign itself was running smoothly. Ron Fisk was a workhorse who did exactly what Tony Zachary told him to do. There was plenty of money. Their television ads were hitting all markets with perfect regularity. The responses from their direct mail were nothing short of astonishing. The campaign had raised $320,000 from small donors who were upset about gays and guns. McCarthy was running hard to catch up and falling further behind.

Mr. Trudeau looked lean and tanned, and he was thrilled with the latest summaries.

The sixteen-point lead dominated the dinner conversation. Carl quizzed Rinehart relendessly about the numbers. Could they be trusted? How were they arrived at? How did they compare with Barry's other races? What would it take to blow the lead? Had Barry ever seen such a big lead evaporate?

Barry all but guaranteed a win.

For the first three quarters of the year, Krane Chemical reported dismal sales and weak earnings. The company was racked with production problems in Texas and Indonesia.

Three plants shut down for major, unscheduled repairs. A plant in Brazil closed for undisclosed reasons, leaving its two thousand employees out of work. Huge orders were unfilled. Longtime customers left in frustration. The sales force could not get product. Competitors cut prices and poached business. Morale was down and there were rumors of major cutbacks and layoffs.

Behind the chaos, Carl Trudeau was skillfully pulling all the strings. He did nothing illegal, but cooking the books was an art he'd mastered many years ago. When one of his companies needed bad numbers, Carl could deliver them. During the year, Krane wrote off huge chunks of research and development, shifted unusually large sums of money into legal reserves, borrowed heavily on its credit lines, stifled sales by sabotaging production, bloated expenses, sold two profitable divisions, and managed to alienate many of its customers.

Through it all, Carl coordinated enough leaks to float a printing press. Since the verdict, Krane had been on the radar of business reporters, and all bad news got plenty of ink. Of course, every story referred to the massive legal problems the company was facing. The possibility of bankruptcy had been mentioned several times, after careful plants by Carl.

The stock began the year at $17.00. Nine months later, it was $12.50. With the election just two weeks away, Carl was ready for one last assault on the battered common shares of Krane Chemical Corporation.

The phone call from Jared Kurtin seemed like a dream. Wes listened to the words and closed his eyes. It could not be true.

Kurtin explained that he had been instructed by his client to explore the possibilities of settling the Bowmore litigation. Krane Chemical was a mess, and until the lawsuits went away, it could not regain its focus and compete effectively.

His proposal was to gather all the attorneys in one room at one time and start the process. It would be complicated because there were so many plaintiffs with so many issues. It would be difficult because there were so many lawyers to control. He insisted that Wes and Mary Grace act as lead counsel for the plaintiffs' lawyers, but they could work out those details at the first meeting. Time was suddenly crucial. Kurtin had already reserved a convention room at a hotel in Hattiesburg, and he wanted the meeting to begin on Friday and run through the weekend, if necessary.

"Today is Tuesday," Wes said, gripping the phone with white knuckles.

"Yes, I know. As I said, my client is anxious to begin this process. It could take weeks or months to complete, but we're ready to sit down."

Wes was ready, too. He had a deposition set for Friday, something that was easily postponed. "What are the rules?" he asked.

Kurtin had the benefit of hours of planning. Wes was reacting out of shock and excitement.

Plus, Kurtin had been around the block a few more times than Wes. He had negotiated mass settlements on several occasions. Wes could only dream of one.

"I'm sending a letter to all known plaintiffs' attorneys," Kurtin said. "Look over the list and see if I'm missing anyone. As you know, they're still popping up. All lawyers are invited, but the easiest way to screw up a settlement conference like this is to give the trial lawyers the microphones. You and Mary Grace will talk for the plaintiffs. I'll talk for Krane. The first challenge is to identify all persons who are making any sort of claim. Our records show about six hundred, and these range from dead bodies to nosebleeds. In my letters, I'm asking the lawyers to submit the names of clients, whether they have filed suit or not. Once we know who expects a piece of the pie, the next challenge will be to classify the claims. Unlike some mass tort settlements with ten thousand plaintiffs, this one will be manageable in that we can talk about individual claims. Our current numbers show 68 dead, 143 wounded and probably dying, and the rest with various afflictions that, in all probability, are not lifethreatening."

Kurtin ticked off the numbers like a war correspondent reporting from battle. Wes couldn't help but grimace, nor could he suppress another vile thought about Krane Chemical.

"Anyway, we'll start the process of going through these numbers. The goal is to arrive at one figure, then compare it with the cash my client is willing to spend."

"And what might that number be?" Wes asked with a desperate laugh.

"Not now, Wes, maybe later. I'm asking each lawyer to fill out a standardized form for each client. If we can get these back before Friday, we'll have a head start.

I'm bringing a full team, Wes. My litigators, support staff, experts, number crunchers, and I'll even have a guy with some spine from Krane. Plus, of course, the usual crew from the insurance companies. You might want to reserve a large room for your support people."

Reserve with what? Wes almost asked. Surely Kurtin knew about the bankruptcy.

"Good idea," he said.

"And, Wes, my client is really concerned about secrecy. There is no reason for this to be publicized. If word gets out, then the plaintiffs and their lawyers and the whole town of Bowmore will get excited. What happens then if the negotiations go nowhere? Let's keep a lid on this."

"Sure." How ridiculous. Kurtin was about to send his letter to no fewer than twenty law firms. Babe at the coffee shop in Bowmore would know about the settlement conference before she began serving lunch.

The following morning the Wall Street Journal ran a front-page story about Krane Chemical's settlement overtures. An anonymous source who worked for the company confirmed the truth of the rumors. Experts chimed in with varying opinions, but it was generally regarded as a positive step for the company. Large settlements can be calculated. Liabilities can be contained.

Wall Street understands hard numbers, and it hates unpredictability. There is a long history of battered companies shoring up their financial futures with massive settlements that, while costly, were effective in cleaning up litigation.

Krane opened at $12.75 and advanced $2.75 in heavy trading.

By midafternoon Wednesday, the phones were ringing nonstop at Payton amp; Payton, and many other law firms as well. Word of a settlement was out there, on the street and flying around the Internet.

Denny Ott called and talked to Mary Grace. A group of Pine Grove residents had gathered at the church to offer prayers, exchange gossip, and wait for a miracle. It was like a vigil, he said. Not surprisingly, there were different versions of the truth. A settlement had already been negotiated, and money was on the way. No, the settlement would take place on Friday, but there was no doubt that it would happen. No, there was no settlement at all, just a meeting of the lawyers. Mary Grace explained what was happening and asked Denny to pass along the truth. It quickly became apparent that either she or Wes would need to hustle over to the church and meet with their clients.

Babe's was packed with spirited coffee drinkers, all looking for the latest word.

Would Krane be required to clean up its toxic dump? Someone claiming authority answered yes, that would be a condition of the settlement. How much would the death claims be worth? Someone else had heard the figure of $5 million each. Arguments raged.

Experts rose up and were soon shouted down.

F. Clyde Hardin walked over from his law office and immediately took center stage.

His class action had been ridiculed by many of the locals who felt he was just riding the Paytons' coattails with a bunch of opportunistic clients. He and his good pal Sterling Bintz from Philadelphia were claiming almost three hundred "severely and permanently injured" members of their class action. Since its filing in January, it had gone nowhere. Now, however, F. Clyde had instantly gained stature. Any settlement had to include "his people." He would have a seat at the table on Friday, he explained to the silent crowd. He would be sitting there along side Wes and Mary Grace Payton.

Jeannette Baker was behind the counter of a convenience store at the south edge of Bowmore when she received the call from Mary Grace. "Do not get excited," her lawyer warned, rather sternly. "This could be a lengthy process, and the possibility of a settlement is remote." Jeannette had questions but did not know where to begin.

Mary Grace would be at the Pine Grove Church at 7:00 p.m. for a full discussion with all of her clients. Jeannette promised to be there.

With a $41 million verdict attached to it, Jeannette Baker's case would be the first one on the table.

The settlement news was too much for Bowmore to handle. In the small offices downtown the secretaries and Realtors and insurance agents talked of nothing else. The languid human commerce along Main Street stopped dead as friends and neighbors found it impossible to pass one another without comparing gossip. The clerks in the Cary County Courthouse collected rumors, amended them, embellished some, and reduced some, then passed them along. In the schools the teachers gathered in their coffee rooms and exchanged the latest news. Pine Grove wasn't the only church where the faithful and the hopeful met for prayer and counseling. Many of the town's pastors spent the afternoon on the phone listening to the victims of Krane Chemical.

A settlement would close the town's ugliest chapter, and allow it to begin again.

The infusion of money would compensate those who had suffered. The cash would be spent and re-spent and boost the dying economy. Krane would certainly be required to clean up its pollution, and once it was finally gone, perhaps the water would become safe again.

Bowmore with clean water-a dream almost impossible to believe.

The community could finally shake off the nickname Cancer County.

A settlement was a fast and final end to the nightmare. No one in the town wanted litigation that would be prolonged and ugly. No one wanted another trial like Jeannette Baker's.

Nat Lester had been pestering newspaper editors and reporters for a month. He was furious at the misleading advertising that had drenched south Mississippi, and even angrier at the editors for not railing against it. He put together a report in which he took the Fisk ads-print, direct mail, radio, Internet, and television-and dissected them, pointing out every lie, half-truth, and manipulated word. He also estimated, based on direct mail media buys, the amount of cash that was pouring into the Fisk campaign. His figure was at least $3 million, and he predicted that the vast majority was coming from out of state. There was no way to verify this until after the election.

His report was e-mailed and sent overnight to every newspaper in the district, then followed up with aggressive phone calls. He updated it every day, then re-sent it and grew even more obnoxious on the phone. It finally paid off.

To his amazement, and great satisfaction, the three largest papers in the district informed him, separately and off the record of course, that they planned to run stinging editorials on the Fisk campaign in the upcoming Sunday editions.

And Nat's luck continued. The same-sex marriage issue caught the attention of the New York Times, and a reporter arrived in Jackson to poke around. His name was Gilbert, and he soon made his way to the McCarthy campaign office, where Nat gave him an earful, off the record. He also gave Gilbert the phone numbers of the two gay law students who were stalking Meyerchec and Spano.

Speaking off the record, they told Gilbert everything and showed him their file.

They had spent four days in Chicago and learned a lot. They met Meyerchec in his bar near Evanston, told him they were new to the city and looking for friends. They spent hours in the place, got roaring drunk with the regulars, and never once heard anyone mention anything about a lawsuit in Mississippi. In the photos in the Jackson paper, Meyerchec had blond hair and funky eyeglasses. In Chicago, the hair was darker and there was no eyewear. His smiling face was in one of the group photos they had taken at the bar. As for Spano, they visited the design center where he worked as a consultant for lower-end home buyers. They pretended to be new residents in an old building nearby, and they spent two hours with him. Noticing their accents, Spano at one point ask *l where they were from.

When they answered Jackson, Mississippi, he had no reaction to the place.

"Ever been there?" one of them asked.

"I've passed through a couple of times," Spano said. This, from a registered voter, a licensed driver, and a current appellant before the state's supreme court. Though Spano was never seen at Meyerchec's bar, it appeared as if the two men were indeed a couple. They shared the same address, a bungalow on Clark Street.

The law students had continued to call and visit the near empty apartment in Jackson, with no response. Forty-one days earlier, while knocking on the door, they stuck a piece of junk mail into a small gap near the doorknob. It was still there; the door had not been opened.

The old Saab had not been moved. One tire was flat.

Gilbert became captivated by the story and pursued it doggedly. The attempt to get married in Mississippi smelled like a cynical ploy to thrust the same-sex marriage issue to the forefront of the McCarthy-Fisk race. And only McCarthy was getting hurt.

Gilbert badgered the radical lawyer who represented Meyerchec and Spano, but got nowhere. He dogged Tony Zachary for two days but couldn't get a word. His phone calls to Ron Fisk and his campaign headquarters went unanswered. He spoke to both Meyerchec and Spano by phone, but was quickly cut off when he pressed them on their ties to Mississippi. He gathered a few choice quotes from Nat Lester, and he verified the facts dug up by the law students.

Gilbert finished his report and sent it in.

Chapter 30

The first fight was over the question of who would be allowed in the room. On the defense side, Jared Kurtin had full command of his battalion and there were no problems.

The brawl was on the other side.

Sterling Bintz arrived early and loudly with an entourage that included young men who appeared to be lawyers and others who appeared to be leg breakers. He claimed to represent over half of the Bowmore victims, and therefore deserved a lead role in the negotiations. He spoke with a clipped nasal voice and in an accent quite foreign to south Mississippi, and he was instantly despised by everyone there. Wes settled him down, but only for a moment. F. Clyde Hardin watched from the safety of a corner, crunching a biscuit, enjoying the argument, and praying for a quick settlement. The IRS was now sending registered letters.

A national toxic tort star from Melbourne Beach, Florida, arrived with his support staff and joined in the debate. He, too, claimed to represent hundreds of injured people, and, since he was a veteran of mass tort settlement, he figured he should handle things from the plaintiffs' side.

The two class action lawyers were soon bickering over stolen clients.

* There were seventeen other law firms jockeying for position. A few were reputable personal injury firms, but most were small-town car-wreck lawyers who had picked up a case or two while sniffing around Bowmore.

Tensions were high hours before the meeting began, and once the yelling started, there was the real possibility of a punch being thrown. When the voices were sharpest, Jared Kurtin calmly got their attention and announced that Wes and Mary Grace Payton would decide who sat where. If anyone had a problem with that, then he and his client and its insurance company would walk out the door with all the money. This calmed things down.

Then there was the issue of the press. At least three reporters were on hand to cover this "secret" meeting, and when asked to leave, they were quite reluctant. Fortunately, Kurtin had arranged for some armed security. The reporters were eventually escorted out of the hotel.

Kurtin had also suggested, and offered to pay for, a referee, a disinterested person well versed in litigation and settlements. Wes had agreed, and Kurtin found a retired federal judge in Fort Worth who worked part-time as a mediator. Judge Rosenthal quietly assumed control after the trial lawyers had settled down. It took him an hour to negotiate the seating. He would have the chair at the end of the long table. To his right, halfway down and in the center, would be Mr. Kurtin, flanked by his partners, associates, Frank Sully from Hattiesburg, two suits from Krane, and one from its liability insurance carrier. A total of eleven at the table for the defense, with another twenty packed behind them.

To his left, the Paytons sat in the center, opposite Jared Kurtin. They were flanked by Jim McMay, the Hattiesburg trial lawyer with four death cases out of Bowmore.

McMay had made a fortune on the fen-phen diet pill litigation and had participated in several mass settlement conferences. He was joined by a lawyer from Gulfport who had similar experience. The other chairs were taken by Mississippi lawyers who had legitimate cases from Bowmore. The class action boys were shoved into the background. Sterling Bintz voiced his objection to his placement in the room, and Wes angrily told him to shut up. When the leg breakers reacted badly, Jared Kurtin announced that the class actions were the lowest priority on Krane's list, and if he, Bintz, hoped to collect a dime, then he should keep quiet and stay out of the way.

"This ain't Philadelphia," Judge Rosenthal said. "Are those bodyguards or lawyers?"

"Both," Bintz snapped back.

"Keep them under control."

Bintz sat down, mumbling and cursing.

It was 10:00 a.m., and Wes was already exhausted. His wife, though, was ready to begin.

For three hours nonstop they shuffled papers. Judge Rosenthal directed traffic as client summaries were produced, copied next door, reviewed, then classified according to the judge's arbitrary rating system: death was Class One, confirmed cancer was Class Two, all others were Class Three.

A stalemate occurred when Mary Grace suggested that Jeannette Baker be given first priority, and thus more money, because she had actually gone to trial. Why is her case worth more than the other death cases? a trial lawyer asked.

"Because she went to trial," Mary Grace shot back with a hard gaze. In other words, Baker's lawyers had the guts to take on Krane while the other lawyers chose to sit back and watch. In the months before the trial, the Paytons had approached at least five of the other trial lawyers present, including Jim McMay, and practically begged them for help. All declined.

"We will concede that the Baker case is worth more," Jared Kurtin said. "Frankly, I'm unable to ignore a $41 million verdict." And for the first time in years, Mary Grace actually smiled at the man. She could have hugged him.

At one, they broke for a two-hour lunch. The Paytons and Jim McMay sat away in a corner of the hotel restaurant and tried to analyze the meeting so far. Going in, they were consumed with the question of Krane's intent. Was it serious about a settlement?

Or was it a stunt to push along the company's agenda? The fact that the national business papers knew so much about the secret settlement talks made the lawyers suspicious.

But so far Mr. Kurtin had given every indication that he was a man on a mission.

There had been no smiles from the Krane suits or the insurance boys, perhaps a sign that they were about to part with their money.

At 3:00 p.m. in New York, Carl Trudeau leaked the word that the negotiations were progressing nicely down in Mississippi. Krane was optimistic about a settlement.

Its stock closed the week at $16.50, up $4.00.

At 3:00 p.m. in Hattiesburg, the negotiators reassumed their positions, and Judge Rosenthal started the paper mill again. Three hours later, the initial accounting was complete. On the table were the claims of 704 people. Sixty-eight had died of cancer, and their families were blaming Krane. A hundred and forty-three were now suffering from cancer. The rest had a wide range of lesser illnesses and afflictions that were allegedly caused by the contaminated drinking water from the Bowmore pumping station.

Judge Rosenthal congratulated both sides on a hard and productive day, and adjourned the meeting until nine o'clock Saturday morning.

Wes and Mary Grace drove straight to the office and reported to the firm. Sherman had been in the negotiating room all day and shared his observations. They agreed that Jared Kurtin had returned to Hattiesburg with the goal of settling the Bowmore litigation and that his client seemed committed to that end. Wes cautioned that it was much too early to celebrate. They had managed only to identify the parties. The first dollar was nowhere near the table.

Date: 2015-12-17; view: 231