Our pal s&fu just alerted me to something interesting (that may, nonetheless, mean absolutely nada):
Air Scruggs, the Dassault Falcon 20 twin-jet that last flew on November 28 from Pascagoula to Oxford, has just filed a flightplan for tomorrow morning from Oxford to Dallas, Texas.
Recall that, on December 1, we learned (via Alyssa) that
[at the Scruggses' and Sid Backstrom's arraignment, U.S. Magistrate Judge S. Allan] Alexander grounded the Scruggs’ plane and demanded all three men turn over their passports. Any travel out of Mississippi would have to be approved by the court. The judge did allow the plane to be used for medical reasons with prior permission from the court.
Medical reasons serious enough to warrant that sort of trip are apt to be gnarly, so folo’s best wishes for an excellent outcome and safe flying to all involved.
lotus
Folks in Pascagoula have told me Scruggs frequently made his plane available to folks that needed help getting to places like M.D. Anderson . Since they made sure I understood this included people he didn’t know who just needed someone to help, I’ll pass that along, too.
Scruggs has 2? N700AL listed as owned by SBM LLC. It’s an Dassault Falcon 10 (twin-jet). It flew to the Packers game last weekend http://flightaware.com/live/flight/N700AL.
Yeah, nowdy, every chance this doesn’t involve any Scruggs at all.
DB, any idea who SBM LLC might be?
https://secure.sos.state.ms.us/busserv/corp/soskb/Corp.asp?274417
Very limited info
SBM, LLC apparently is totally unrelated to Scruggs. On the other hand, SBM Aviation, Inc. was (it is dissolved) associated with the Scruggs firm in Pascagoula and was formed in 1997.
https://secure.sos.state.ms.us/busserv/corp/soskb/Corp.asp?230192
This is the aviation one.
Look at the above LLC aviation and see Ms Bosarge’s address (she is a director) on Delmas Street. Where have I heard Delmas? Was there a deposition in Luckey that mentioned a Delmas Capitol where money was being sent?
Charlene Bosarge is Scruggs’ secretary. I think she has been for like 25+ years.
And I would imagine SBM stands for Scruggs-Benton-McCormick, the three principals listed besides Ms. Bosarge.
Delmas Ave. was the location of Scruggs firm when it was in Pascagoula.
Well that probably explains Delmas Capitol–I knew I had seen Delmas somewhere.
Delmas Capital is the name of that entity Scruggs created that all of the tobacco attorneys’ fees go into. They are then paid through Delmas. Scruggs describes it in the Luckey trial transcript I think.
Minds like steel traps, I’m tellin’ ya.
Since this started on an airplane note, as an aside, if you Google Langston’s tail number – N484AT – you will see it listed for sale for $5,495,000.00.
Welcome to folo, SFttE — glad to have your perspective in the mix.
No surprise there, wc’ly: he sure won’t be needing (or able to afford feeding) it anymore.
Mr. Langston home in Aspen is also up for sale, and the Prentiss County Deed titles have been swapped around quite a bit since the first week of December..So I have been told, could all be just rumors..The Two Million Dollar house with the MILLION DOLLAR FENCE is still in his name..no change there.
sbm is scruggs, benton, minor they sold the jet years ago to david mccormick. md anderson is in houston not dallas. david nutt has a place out from dallas. maybe that’s where pl blake is these days? just a thought.
dear friend of scruggs: was the money used to pay the beggar the money of wilson, luckey, lawson, jones? whose money was it? did he charge the kid’s operation to his tobacco partners. it’s easy to be generous when the money you give is not yours but is stolen from someone else.
Good catch, watching closely and magnolia, as to the liquidation of Langston’s assets. Even though his plea agreement proscribes asset forfeiture, I would imagine Mr. Langston is looking at some significant civil litigation, especially from Bobs Wilson. My guess is that Mr. Wilson will end up emptying the coffers of both Scruggs and Langston.
Eventually I’ll have to work up a whole new “First thing we do, let’s ID all the lawyers/Civil Division,” won’t I, Dragoman?
Indeed you will, lotus, when it comes time for the civil rodeo. Of course, it might all be handled quietly, but with this mob you never know, especially with the punitive monies likely to be involved.
Ooo-wee, no puny punies there, nuh-uh.
That’s a good story about the kid. But, why didn’t he just check out who the kid was when he saw him, instead of sending a P.I. back later? I would think actually finding the same kid would be a hell of a long shot. Unless he felt more guilty about the kid later, than he did at the moment.
Sorry, but it’s just one of those stories that sounds sweet at first, and then a little weird when you think about it some more.
But, it is good to have friends who will stand by you no matter what. And, the bigger the no matter what is, the bigger friend they need to be, I guess.
You got a whole boatload of good points there, observer.
Langston’s house is actually in Telluride. It’s on the market for $8,950,00.00 and can be seen here: http://www.telluriderealestateonline.com/MyHomeDtl.asp?lstPages=&HomeID=637295
I find it incredibly strange that someone would offer such wonderful services to a stranger, all the while trying to prevent his colleagues from receiving the money they had EARNED.
Quite the chalet, wc’ly. One year’s heating bill prolly = my entire net worth.
I dunno, is being that close to the right side of a ski trail as inadvisable as being that close to the right side of a golf fairway?
It irks me every time I hear about how Scruggs stole Wilson’s money and Luckey’s money, and most of all Jones’ money. The basic theory of the Wilson/Luckey litigation is that Wilson and Luckey went to court to recover tens of millions of dollars for litigation in which they did absolutely no work. Regarding Jones, if you want an example of his second-rate writing style, you need look no further than the amended complaint in his lawsuit againt the SKG. It’s so emotional it should have a soundtrack. From what I have read in the press, it seems like Jones was offered a fair amount of money for the work he did, but he and his firm got greedy and wanted more. To satisfy the blogosphere, Scruggs would have had to open his pocketbook with no questions asked to every greedy ex-partner who hit him up for a bigger percentage of the fee.
If it was that simple wouldn’t going on to court have been a better alternative than trying to bribe a judge/judges????
What jury has decided that Scruggs tried to bribe a judge/judges?
Ahhhh…..got me….Ok….I will admit…the jury of public opinion in which I am a member. When the evidence shifts in Dickie’s favor I reserve the right to switch sides. Isn’t blogging fun???!!!!
To satisfy the blogosphere Mr. Scruggs and Mr. Langston merely had to play fair. If Wilson et al. were owed no money, fine, let it all be argued fairly in court. Offering inducements to a sitting judge in order to obtain a favorable ruling is not my idea of fair play.
Scruggs can use his money and power to buy a lot of things, Thanatos. Unfortunately, for him, our opinions on his guilt or innocence are not on that list.
I can imagine how annoying that probably is.
My objection is to the prevailing view of Wilson, et al. as modest exemplars of the legal profession. In reality, they were not simply looking for the asbestos fees they felt they were owed, plus interest. They were looking for the asbestos fees, plus interest, plus a sizeable chunk of the tobacco fees, and they pursued this novel legal theory for years. The focus is constantly on Scruggs’ greed. My point is: what about the greed of his antagonists?
In response to your point, I speculate that Scruggs could not ever satisfy you by simply “playing fair.” You strike me as one of those who hated him before any of this bribery business came out. The constant drumbeat, without any real analysis, is that Scruggs “stole” these guys money and “cheated” them out of millions. I suggest a look at the merits of the cases before making Wilson, Luckey and Jones the blameless victims. Also, remember that Langston has entered a guilty plea, not Scruggs. You’re assuming too much with the “playing fair” comment.
Does P.L. Blake have a plane these days? Stories a plenty of his using his plane for influence in years past. Maybe too costly now days.
Keep going in this direction, SFttE, and you’ll get yourself permanently banned. Matter of fact, threatening commenters here suffices already, so you’re history.
Didn’t Langston also reserve the right to withdraw his plea?
I don’t believe anyone here has ever asserted that Mr. Scruggs “stole” money from any of those parties, Thanatos. That’s the word you keep using. To me they’re just parties to a legal fees dispute that, according to Langston’s pleading, was the object of a bribery attempt.
And I think we’re all familiar with the basic merits or lack thereof in the cases to which you refer, but that’s beside the point at this juncture. That train has left the station, and whether or not Wilson, Luckey and Jones are greedy antagonists is likewise irrelevant. They certainly had the expectation of a fair hearing in court, absent the shenanigans alleged in the Langston pleading.
And yes, you’re right. Mr. Scruggs hasn’t pled guilty in this or any other matter. I don’t believe he’s even been indicted in the Hinds County matter. So perhaps I am assuming too much in my “fair play” comment. We’ll see about all that, though, as this thing shakes out.
As for your rank speculation as to my personal feelings about Mr. Scruggs one way or the other, well, who’s being emotional now?
Thanatos makes a good point. There aren’t a lot of heroes in this story, except Judge Lackey, I guess. Be careful about taking sides in a fight over lawyer fees, because in those situations usually nobody’s entirely in the right or wrong.
Ahem.
We can stay here and chat, but you might want to open a new window on folo’s homepage too. NMC will be joining us there “upstairs” directly . . . with news you won’t want to miss.
I may not take sides in a fight over lawyers’s fees. But, I will always take sides in a fight over the merits of trying to improperly influence or bribe a judge.
Scruggs isn’t indicted because he jaywalked. Langston, Patterson, and Balducci didn’t plead guilty because they were speeding.
It’s one thing to claim a conspiracy of lies by your enemies. It’s a little harder to sell a conspracy of lies by your friends and associates. Not that Scruggs or his remaining friends won’t try.
Observer, my point is, whatever Scruggs et al. did or didn’t do, and the jury’s still out on that one, it’s silly to try to make heroes out of Wilson, Luckey, Jones, Tollison, etc. They are lawyers looking for money, just like everybody else.
Like the man said, follow the money.
There has only been one lawyer involved in this whole mess who I view as a hero here. And, that is Judge Lackey.
And, I have heard the “No one’s innocent, here” defense. Usually it involves crack dealers shooting it out over territory. Maybe that fits here better than I have considered before.
lotus, thanks for banning the one who was threatening to get subpoenas and throwing out words like “defamation”. That would have been enough to keep me outta here, even though I’m pretty certain I’ve never said anything defamatory on this blog (or elsewhere for that matter).
Thanatos, as I understand the result in the Wilson case, Wilson got stiffed– the special master initially ruled he should get $15,000,000 in fees, and DeLaughter rejected that ruling. It’s that order that is the subject of the Langston guilty plea.
Yes, Wilson and Luckey both had claims that Scruggs hung on to their share of the asbestos fees and used it to finance the tobacco litigation. In a context where lawyers were being asked to invest in those cases and ultimately got very big payoffs if they did, that theory doesn’t seem that far out there to me. It came up short in the Luckey case in a case that was tried fair-and-square, apparently, but that doesn’t make it questionable.
And, yep, you right about one thing: Those cases were all about greed, on both sides. Most civil lawsuits are about money, so that shouldn’t be a surprise.
Of course you haven’t defamed anyone, MSlawyer — nor has anyone else who’s commented here (or they’d have been banned on the spot too). I just won’t have folo commenters threatened — especially not by a flaming asshole like that person (whose email and IP addresses and threatening language I have now carefully recorded).
And that’s why I LOVE this place so much, lotus. Thank you!
observer, I’m no crack dealer – but there are so many cracks in this “mess” that I don’t think we are close to the point of knowing what claims of innocence – or guilty pleas for that matter – mean in this context or Judge Lackey for that matter.
I still can’t get over the fact that he introduced money to the conversation – and regardless of how honorable his intent, he fell below my standard for heroic when he did that.
Thanatos, in reference to your comments at 4:33pm re: Jones, I do feel a bit of a need to come to his defense as someone who has known him and his family for a number of years. First, I would point out that he was not the one who wrote the amended complaint which, I agree, is over the top (as if the original complaint wasn’t). Mr. Jones is well respected as an attorney and a writer and is known in Jackson as one of the few “honest” workers’ compensation attorneys. He gave up his practice and devoted all of his resources to the SKG for over a year and got nothing in return except a screwjob. He did everything he could do to keep from taking this matter into litigation, and obviously Scruggs et. al felt there was enough merit in his claims to try to bribe a judge to influence it. For a better perspective on Jones’ and Funderburg’s mindsets, refer to the exhibits at the end of this pleading:
http://www.insurancecoverageblog.com/Jones%20v.%20Scruggs%20defendant's%20reply%20to%20supp.%20briefing.pdf
I’m specifically referring to Jones’ email where he states “I want to avoid this as bad as I need to be paid for committng 2 and % years on my law practice to what Dick has asked of me, but if
that is where it is headed this is going to be awful for all of us.” Also of note is Funderburg’s email to Scruggs on the third to last page. I think all of this has been mentioned on the site before, but it’s worth reading again.
Coastian, you opened the door to something that has puzzled me and that’s the 2+ years mentioned in Jones’ email – so much so, in fact, that at one point I posted a related comment that it might have confused the other members of SKG.
The suit filed by Tollison made specific reference to a time-limited period of work for SKG – the six months from October 05- March 06.
Was the other work in the remaining 18+ months under a different agreement as that suggests? If so, wasn’t the initial $1,000,000 offer appropriate compensation from the settlement?
nowdoucit – Judge Lackey brought money into the deal at the direction of the FBI. And, for a very good reason- to expose what was really being offered to Judge Lackey-something of value. It’s easy for a person trying to bribe a judge with a job to say, “Oh, this is just a big misunderstanding. You can’t say that when you convert the abstract value of a job offer into the concrete offer of cash.
If people are having trouble understanding what happened with the addition of cash into the equation, it would have been twice as hard to make people understand the dynamics of what was happening with just a job offer on the table.
If the DeLaughter situation doesn’t demonstrate what a good idea that was by the feds, I don’t know what else could do it for people.
The fact that Judge Lackey is even a suspect in some people’s minds is a reminder to me of why you can’t ever assume a fact is so obvious in a trial that you don’t need to prove it. An old lesson that I learned the hard way when I was trying a lot of cases.
Anyone trying to find me to file a defamation suit is welcome (unlike Scruggs, and company, I do understand how IP address and server traces work).
Nowdoucit – Well, you’ve got me stumped there. I can’t imagine that he is referring to the prior work they did defending Scruggs in the Wilson case. Maybe he’s referring to the collective efforts of everyone in his firm totaling 2 1/2 years, but even if one assumes him and 2 other associates working full time during that time period it doesn’t add up to 2 and a half years. That’s a good point and I’ll have to check up on that.
To Dragoman, 6:16 p.m. who said no one but me had used the word “stolen,” see Confounded’s 3:20 p.m. comment where he says that Scruggs used stolen money to help the beggar in the Bahamas.
To Coastian, 7:38 p.m., who said Johnny Jones invested resources to fight Katrina cases, that’s wrong. It has been reported authoritatively that the litigation was funded by Nutt & Associates.
Also, at the time Jones wrote that letter about devoting 2 1/2 years of his law practice to Katrina, it was about a year and a half after the storm.
To Nmisscommentator, I don’t think the context of people investing in the tobacco cases makes the Wilson/Luckey theories of recover any more viable. The bottom line is that they were seeking fees from a case in which they had no involvement, and in which they had invested no money. It was a silly theory that any lawyer would have fought against tooth and nail.
Coastian, I believe it was only 1.5 attorneys from Jones. I never found the SKG joint venture agreement to be the vague document others have claimed. Of course, unlike myself, most “others” are lawyers.
I even went so far as the compare the work claimed in the suit to the terms of the agreement – primarily, I might add because Jones is so well thought of and it bothered me that I had questions.
You might find some of my comments helpful to your effort by searching under “Memphis” here on folo – as we had a discussion about some of this recently. My comments will show up on thread and I believe I linked the Forbes interview with Jones which had related comment.
nowdoucit, I haven’t read it in weeks, but as i recall what is startling about it to a lawyer is that it sets up a joint venture with no agreement at all among the people involved about how they are going to split the proceeds from the venture. None. No % shares. No formula. “Vague” doesn’t really capture that gap. It’s like saying you’ve bought a car but there is no price.
Ole Scruggs sure has bested many a smart lawyer through time. No formula no sweat pardners.
Pigs love mud. Hope, fear and greed run this world. Morality is knowin’ that basic fact and not taking advantage of it. Self awareness means you got the sense to steer clear of the pigs and the mud.
Ole Jones sure thought he was smart but boy was he a dumbass huh, just like ole Dave from Portland who was bested by this cornpone Cowboy. Ego sure does cloud self awareness folks.
Speakin’ of ego, you folks reckon ole Jim Hood knows what he is doin’
Thanastos – I’m not disputing that Nutt was funding the litigation, but I guess what I am trying to get at is that Mr. Jones was foregoing his normal workload and instead working full time for the SKG. Under that line of thinking, at least, that meant that he was foregoing a substantial income that he would have normally have earned, in pursuit of the SKG venture.
Nowdoucit – I believe it was Jones & Funderburg who were both working full time on the litigation, and Stewart Lee was devoting half of his time to it, and that is where I arrived at my 2.5. But I may be wrong. And as a non-lawyer, I can’t speak to the vagueness of the joint venture agreement. And I will look at your previous comments when I get a chance tomorrow.
Both of the people to whom I am responding make excellent points and I duly acknowledge them. I’m just trying to add a little context from where I see it. Y’all keep up the great work. This whole thing has become my favorite thing to follow since 11/28/07.
I understand NMC – what I can’t understand is why I don’t share that opinion after reading the agreement and the referenced governing documents.
The only thing I’ve been able to figure out is that lawyers don’t have a lot of experience writing contracts dividing up the % share of $0.
My non-lawyer self, on the other hand, learned long ago that when investing “sweat equity” it was better to settle for 1% of something than end up with 100% of nothing.
Nowdoucit – You’ve absolutely got that right. I would have never entered into such an ambiguous agreement myself.
Thanatos: you can’t have it both ways. The use of Wilson and luckey’s money in tobacco and asbestos means nothing to you because being unfamiliar with the facts you say no work was involved. Then you say scruggs’ is justified on breaching contract with jones because jones only worked but did not contribute money. It might help if you looked at tom lee’s opinion wherein he stated these defenses of scruggs’ meant nothing because the work without the money to finance the venture would be nothing AND the money without the work would be meaningless. They can’t be divided.
If you think jones work was not any good a fact I seriously doubt, a look at pacer indicates he did not at least submit filings on paper napkins as the arrogant mr zach would have done.
I agree stolen is not quite the right word embezzled and converted is more precise
Well put Confounded! Preventing unjust enrichment is not “novel” or “silly”.
Scruggs plane has all scheduled maintenance done in Dallas.
Hoddy Toddy Gosh Amighty
Who Will The Defendants Be?
Whim Wham Bim Bam
We Don’t Know By Damn!
In advance my apologies to the great Ole Miss. folks. Just couldn’t resist.
Hey, box’ie — are you on a different ‘puter this morning? Sorry you ended up in moderation again, but that might be why.
Lotus, Same computer but using firefox instead of explorer. Had some problems with explorer. Thanks for your watchful eye, you do a great job. BTW what happened to the discussion for some type of compensation for your site. A decision needs to be made because we all need to pitch in. I do not post often but try to read every word as I am hooked. Also this will go on for a long long long time. Would like to do my part.
Boxcar like you I am waiting for direction!
Thanks so much, guys. “Webmeddler” riddenword is working on the new folo site with me, and we’re so close to having it ready (complete with one-time donation and subscription buttons and — TaDA — commenter self-editing function!) that it may just be better to wait for the move to put ‘em up.
I’ll let you know the new address very soon, and shortly after that, we’ll pick up this whole place and move. We’s all excited!
Morning everyone and “me, too” to all the comments on the “new” folo.
confounded, I don’t know about the “old ventures” but the SKG agreement did speak to $ – the initial capital investment by Nutt and the relationship between future capital calls and participation. If a “call” was issued, members were given a specific period of time to respond and those unable to meet the call were only owed for their work.
If or how relevant those terms are to the Jones case, I don’t know but they are in the JV agreement.