by Reason of Sanity (14 page)

atty Vogel and I both agree on an arbitration date and also upon one of JAMS’ ‘neutrals,’ to act as the hearing officer. The date for the hearing has been set for next week at their downtown location in the Los Angeles World Trade Center, so I’m now in the process of getting my argument ready… not the argument I’ll give to the arbitrator – the one I’ll be giving to Patty Vogel, to get her to settle the case

before the hearing begins.
If Jack Bibberman comes through for me, I should have the information I need to do my usual prehearing rant.

Patty Vogel introduces herself to me in a polite professional manner, while at the same time maintaining an attitude that lets me know that she means business. I can’t help but feel that she has a subtle smirk on her face – like she knows something that I don’t know. I’ve seen that before and one of my great pleasures in life is being lucky enough on some occasions to remove the smirks from smug lawyers like that.

At the last minute, Jack Bibberman came through and provided me with some smirk-removal ammunition, so my only decision now is how to go about using it; the soft way, or the hard way. Normally, I prefer doing it as politely as possible, but people who smirk usually make it impossible for me to do it that way – and I have a feeling that Patty Vogel will be doing just that.

Patty Vogel tells the arbitrator that she’d like a few moments to discuss a settlement with me before the hearing starts. The arbitrator doesn’t care because he gets paid his minimum whether we have a hearing or not. She motions to a small conference room and invites me to join her in there. I tell Vinnie and Stuart that this will only take a few minutes and that they should wait for me in the lobby. Vinnie is surprised, but Stuart knows me well enough to have confidence in me, so he assures Vinnie that everything’s okay.

I’ve already discussed this case at length with Vinnie and he knows my feelings about it. If he gets anything out of it at all, it’ll be some low nuisance amount, probably less than a thousand dollars – and he agreed.

As I go into the conference room with Patty, I notice that something is turned around here. Usually it’s me who does the inviting into a conference room to talk about a settlement. Now it’s someone else inviting me into the little room. Does she think she’s going to do me the favor of allowing me to settle before the hearing? Boy, she’s got stones.

I’ve always had the reputation of being a good sport, so I politely accept her invitation and we both step into the conference room. She motions for me to sit down. This is going to be good. I’ll bet she’s practiced her speech all the way down here today. Now it starts.

“Mister Sharp, I want to give you a chance to save yourself some time and avoid embarrassment in front of your client. If we settle this matter before the hearing, I’ll lie about it and tell him that you did a great job.”

She must want me to think she’s a warm, considerate person. Actually, she’s a little out of touch with reality, but I’ll try to correct that in a while. I smile at her with my most sincere look of appreciation for how wonderful she must think she is. She goes on in a quiet tone of voice. If you watch the bad guys in the movies, you may note that the most menacing ones are those who can make a deadly threat in a quiet voice with a slight smile on their face ala Christopher Walken or Clint Eastwood. It doesn’t take any particular talent to shout and swear like Tony Soprano when you’re making a threat, but to keep your cool and be soft-spoken takes a quality that Patty Vogel must think she possesses. She continues, like a gangster in some ‘B’ movie.

“You are going to settle this case here and now, in this room, because if you don’t, you will receive nothing.

“I’ve had it up to here with cheap personal injury ambulance chasers and I know what you want. All you care about is stealing a few dollars from the insurance company, so I’m going to give you a little, just enough to make bottom-feeders like you and your peeing client go away.”

Hmmmn. Not exactly as eloquent as I’d expected, but she does manage to convey her feelings. As I’ve said before, one of the first rule of holes that a person learns is, when you’re in one, stop digging. Evidently, Patty doesn’t know that rule, so she continues burrowing down further and is now about to ask for an even bigger shovel.

“Sharp, you’ve got no case here. First of all, the defendant was not an employee of the restaurant. Second, he wasn’t even a customer… he was a bartender for a private party that had nothing to do with my client’s restaurant.

“Third, nobody in the restaurant knew whether he walked to his bartending job or drove and no one paid any attention to whether or not he drank. They had no duty to and no responsibility to.

“When he left work, he was on his own. Liability for his decision to take that vehicle from the restaurant parking lot can in no way be traced back and neither can any event that took place subsequent to the taking.

“To sum it up, you have no case. Your client is the scum of the earth, a pornographer, who was relieving himself in public. If anything, it should be your client who should be arrested for lewd conduct.

“Do yourself a favor and settle now. I’ve been authorized to offer you a five hundred dollar nuisance amount and because I feel that both you and your client are nuisances, if you have a brain, you’ll take the five hundred and advise your client to accept it. If it was up to me it would only be fifty cents, so why not do yourself a favor, take your money and get the hell out of here with your tail between your legs?”

This is what I get for trying to give her some respect. My decision now is how to let her know that we aren’t going to settle for the five hundred, and instead would like five thousand. I think it best to remain calm and be as polite as possible. To be any other way would mean that I’m no better than she is, and that’s no good. I start out by asking her a question. “Are you through now?”

She still can’t let it go. Her answer shows it. “Yes Mister Sharp, I’m through now and so are you, and I hope you finally realize it.”

It’s really hard to be nice to someone who is so obnoxious, but I’m going to try. “Please sit down, Patty my dear, I’ve got a few things to tell you. They may have nothing at all to do with the law, but I’m sure you’ll be interested in hearing them, because it might help you to re-adjust your attitude about this case.”

She looks up at me astonished. Her eyes are bulging out at me and the expression on her face is rapidly turning to one of anger. As she starts to turn red, I continue.

“First of all, we are not accepting your offer of five hundred dollars, and if for any reason there actually is a hearing today and we are not successful, we intend to file a municipal court action against you and your husband.”

She gasps for breath in disbelief. That’s a good sign. If I really do my job, maybe she’ll start to hyperventilate. I go on. “Secondly, the reason that the restaurant’s liability is not cut off by Harry’s intervening act of taking the car is because there was no grand theft. In fact, there was no theft at all because not only did you refuse to make a charge of theft, you never filed a police report, never made a claim to your insurance company, lied to your husband about the claim and who paid for the damages and also because Harry Michaels had permission to use that vehicle as he had in the past, because you were having an affair with him.”

It worked. She’s starting to hyper-ventilate. I must be on a roll. Usually, all they do in situations like this is glare at me angrily. I only hope she stays conscious long enough for me to finish up, because I’m not through with her yet. If she only had the control and professionalism to show me some respect and apologize for the fact that all her client authorized was five hundred, I would have probably tried to talk her up to seven-fifty and the matter would be a done deal. But nooo, she had to try and stick it to me in the rudest way I’ve ever seen, so whatever she gets now she really deserves. I have an emergency paper bag in my briefcase, so if she starts to black out, I’ll come to the rescue.

“Mizz Vogel, here is the affidavit signed by my private investigator, in which he states that your picture was identified by several of Harry Michaels’ neighbors, who fingered you as being a constant visitor to his apartment. We also have discovered by subpoena that you were instrumental in getting him bailed out on two occasions after he was arrested for drunk driving. You had your employer act as his sponsor on those bail bonds and Mister Robert Palmer, owner of the restaurant, was also the person who hired him as bartender at the party. That means that both you and Palmer were aware of Harry’s drinking problem – but you still hired him to tend bar and dole out booze all evening, much of which he proceeded to ingest, as both of you should be charged with knowing.

“When he finally stumbled out of the restaurant, your husband had just pulled up and walked inside. Harry didn’t know your husband was going to be there, because you arranged for him to come and pick you up after you were sure that Harry would already have finished for the evening and gone home. Harry never saw your husband before and didn’t recognize him if he did. All Harry saw was the car that you had let him use on numerous occasions, so he probably figured you wouldn’t mind him using it one more time to drive himself home.

“I don’t know what story you told your husband, but I do know that you lied to the police when you told them that your husband had stopped in just for a moment to pick up some vegetarian burritos
– and making a false statement to the police is a violation that can get your license to practice law pulled for a while.

“Now that we’ve established that there was no car theft here, and because Harry was really driving that vehicle with your implied permission, you and your husband liable for negligent entrustment of an automobile and that’s not too good for you either. “So, I have to agree with you. This case will be settled right here and now. You were certainly right about that, but it won’t be to save me any embarrassment, it will be to save your sorry rear end from being sued, suspended, and probably divorced. Now, as for the amount, I’d like to be able to tell my client that he’ll be getting five thousand dollars for his troubles, so while I’m out there getting congratulated, I’ll expect you to compose yourself, make out that five thousand dollar check directly to my client, go tell the arbitrator that we’ve settled and that you’ll be paying his fee and then come out and tell my client what a great job I’ve done.”