One of the most interesting pieces of coverage I’ve found since having time to look for Dickie-pleads reactions is Richard Fausset, Jenny Jarvie and Henry Weinstein’s at the Los Angeles Times. Just the thing for this Saturday morning, since it’s full of reflection (of which we foloers, especially those of us long personally-acquainted with Dickie and others of his set, have no lack of our own, of course).
But Fausset, Jarvie, and Weinstein were working the phones hard yesterday, coming up with quotes from other folks with special perspectives. You’ll find the whole story worthwhile, I imagine, but here, let me pick us a few cherries:
Matt Myers, president of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids: “Dick Scruggs’ genius was he figured out how to make a lot of money doing a lot of good for a lot of people. The irony is that . . . the lawyer who revealed how many other lawyers buried documents and were complicit in the tobacco industry’s cover-up is the only one who is likely to go to jail.”
Stephen Gillers, legal ethics expert at NYU Law School: “You ask why would someone do this . . . to risk so much for so little. . . . Because they think they can.” (This and the Eliot Mess prompt Gillers’ new definition of cognitive dissonance: “You know it’s true, but you still can’t believe it.”)
James R. Robie, attorney for State Farm in Katrina-related cases: “[Dickie] became completely intoxicated by power.”
Mike Moore, former Mississippi Attorney General who still thinks Dickie did tremendous good for public health: “Today’s events don’t change that a bit. He’s a very good man who made a mistake he’ll pay for the rest of his life.”
David Rossmiller, lawyer-blogger who thinks State Farm will benefit, Coast policy-holders suffer by virtue of Dickie’s guilty plea: “It affects the potential jury pool for a civil case, whether anybody wants to admit that or not.”
And finally, whom should LAT give the last word but our dear Ole Miss Law professor-emeritus Aaron Condon, at last saying something unmistakable: “It’s like every other great tragedy where the hero turned out to have feet of clay. I would never have thought that he would be so lacking in judgment as to risk his career and his future like this.”
Here, by the way, are some Oxpatchers’ reactions as told to NEMSDJ’s Errol Castens.
But now tell me, dear friends, what’s your main thought on Dickie’s Saga this morning? Nobody asked, but here’s mine: “Hold on. We ain’t seen nuthin yet.”
lotus
UPDATE: Don’t know quite what to make of this. This LAT story, as it is now and when I saw it, has/had only the one short sentence about/from State Farm attorney Robie (as you see above). But I was just over at Rossmiller’s, where he’s got a longer version of that passage:
“You know, I’ve spent hundreds of hours letting that issue marinate, because it boggles my mind,” said James Robie, a Los Angeles attorney who is representing dozens of Katrina-related cases Scruggs’ clients brought against State Farm Insurance. “I believe he became completely intoxicated by power. . . . And he’s so avaricious that he’d often tie in with it, ‘How many millions can I rake in?’ Just because it was a game.”
Rossmiller posted the chewier quote yesterday. Wonder why they sanitized it after that . . . sorta reminds you of the Clarion-Ledger‘s clean-up job on their Zach claim yesterday, no?
I hope you’re right, lotus, and that the feds aren’t going to stop until they’ve completely cleaned out the nest of corruption that Judge Lackey exposed.
My main thought this morning, however, is sympathy for Diane Scruggs and the innocent families of the others. They didn’t do anything wrong, but their worlds have been destroyed just the same. I guess I’m nearly as angry with Dickie for doing that to them as for what he did to the judicial system.
Okay, just read the Daily Journal’s new stuff from this morning. Check out this from the Dean of the Ole Miss law school.
“My initial reaction is one of sadness,” said Samuel Davis, dean of the University of Mississippi Law School, Scruggs’ alma mater. “I’ve known and been friends with Dick and Diane Scruggs almost 50 years now going back to our days in Pascagoula, and I feel a great sense of compassion for him and his family. And that’s just a very personal reaction. I haven’t really thought about the implications for the legal community or the legal profession.”
Davis, who also directs the Ole Miss Law Center, said not everybody who pleads guilty is guilty and that Scruggs might have had other reasons for the move. If that were the case, Davis said, the reasons likely were good ones.
Is Dean Davis trying to tell us that Scruggs isn’t guilty and that he only said he was for altruistic reasons? Come on, Dean, you’re in charge of educating more lawyers. If this is really how you feel, maybe you need to find another line of work.
Amen, MSlawyer. Hundreds if not thousands of innocent bystanders suffer because U.S. v. Scruggs became necessary.
Dickie, Joey, Zach, Sid, Balducci, Patterson, Peters, P.L., the other wrongdoers — they’re the only ones who deserve it, and if we ruled the world, they alone would get to hog all the punishment, just the way they used to hog money and glory.
Ole Miss Law, you need a new dean, and I mean NOW.
What about all the employees of these two lawfirms. Their children, spouses and others. Their lives have been turned upside down. I am one of these.
SW/c, you and others in your situation are who I meant by “hundreds if not thousands.” You-all have NO just deserts to what came your way via this, and that’s awful.
BUT may it somehow, in life’s strange way, work out to have been the best for each of you in retrospect — leading you to opportunities for new jobs, places, or people that you’ll look back on and decide you wouldn’t have missed for the world.
You may think this is the worst thing that has happened to you, Someone W/cents , but in the end, it may turn out to be the best thing that ever happened.
The behavior the lawyers in these firms were engaging in, by all indications, was not going to stop until something like this happened. It is not inconceivable, that they could have drawn in even more members or employees of the firm into it, as it continued.
Think of it like that, and you might be more thankful of your entire situation.
What the Ole Miss law dean said is unbelievable. What are young law students to take from this–that to cheat is o.k.? Does the law school really need Scruggs’ backing enough to gloss over what has been done to the legal system in Mississippi? I personally hope this does not stop until the entire system has been put back on course, and I think there are many more heads to roll, and some of them are in high places.
In the Wilson case, that brought all of this about, the lawyers are fighting over 26 MILLION dollars in insurance fees…(maybe it was on 23, I can’t remember)
My son, a flood and wind victim in Bay St. Louis, found out yesterday, after we finally got him back into his house by spending hundreds of hours of back breaking labor found out yesterday that he must pay taxes on his Katrina “Grant”. He was a first responder and spent more than 7 months working 12-18 hour days trying to right the upside down world left by this storm and now he gets a $9,000 tax bill. Those are the victims, he,his family and his neighbors who had greedy lawyers consume the money that should have rebuilt their devastated lives.
Now the lawyers are fighting over fees that could have fixed so many of those broken homes and public spaces.
My God, Lurker, that’s unconscionable and ought to be a national scandal. How many people are in your son’s situation? I swear, our government’s gone stark-raving mad!
I once described D. Scruggs as a hungry wolf in a gentleman’s clothing. I like Robie’s word–avaricious. D. Scruggs is an avaricious wolf in a gentleman’s clothing.
A rich and powerful man has fallen upon a sword of his own making.