The Runaway Jury (14 page)

Fitch sent Doyle and a local operative named Joe Boy to take pictures from a distance.

BRONSKY WORE THIN as the afternoon progressed. He lost his talent for keeping things simple, and the jurors lost their struggle to stay tuned. The fancy and obviously expensive charts and diagrams ran together, as did the body parts and compounds and poisons. The opinions of superbly trained and hideously expensive jury consultants were not needed to know that the jurors were bored, that Rohr was engaging in a practice lawyers simply can’t avoid—overkill.

His Honor adjourned early, at four, his reason being that two hours were needed to hear some motions and other things not involving the jury. He discharged the jurors with the same dire warnings, admonitions they now had memorized and barely heard. They were delighted to escape.

Lonnie Shaver was particularly thrilled to leave early. He drove straight to his supermarket, ten minutes away, parked in his special place in the rear, and made a quick entrance through the stockroom, secretly hoping to catch a wayward sacker napping
by the lettuce. His office was upstairs above the dairy and meats, and from behind a two-way mirror he could see most of the floor.

Lonnie was the only black manager in a chain of seventeen stores. He earned forty thousand dollars a year, with health insurance and an average pension plan, and was due for a raise in three months. He’d also been led to believe he’d be promoted to the level of a district supervisor, assuming his tenure as manager produced satisfactory results. The company was anxious to promote a black, he’d been told, but, of course, none of these commitments were in writing.

His office was always open, and usually occupied with any one of a half-dozen subordinates. An assistant manager greeted him, then nodded toward a door. “We have guests,” he said, with a frown.

Lonnie hesitated and looked at the closed door, which led to a large room used for everything—birthday parties, staff meetings, visits from bosses. “Who is it?” he asked.

“Home office. They want to see you.”

Lonnie rapped on the door, entering as he knocked. It was, after all, his office. Three men with their sleeves rolled up to their elbows sat at the end of the table, amid a pile of papers and printouts. They stood awkwardly.

“Lonnie, good to see you,” said Troy Hadley, son of one of the owners, and the only face Lonnie recognized. They shook hands as Hadley made hasty introductions. The other two men were Ken and Ben; Lonnie wouldn’t remember their last names until later. It had been planned that Lonnie would sit at the end of the table, in the chair eagerly vacated
by the young Hadley, with Ken on one side and Ben on the other.

Troy started the conversation, and he sounded somewhat nervous. “How’s jury duty?”

“A pain.”

“Right. Look, Lonnie, the reason we’re here is that Ken and Ben are from an outfit called SuperHouse, a large chain out of Charlotte, and, well, for lots of reasons, my dad and my uncle have decided to sell out to SuperHouse. The whole chain. All seventeen stores and the three warehouses.”

Lonnie noticed that Ken and Ben were watching him breathe, so he took the news with a straight face, even offered a very slight shrug, as if to say, “So what?” He was, however, finding it hard to swallow. “Why?” he managed to ask.

“Lots of reasons, but I’ll give you the top two. My dad is sixty-eight, and Al, as you know, just had surgery. That’s number one. Number two is the fact that SuperHouse is offering a very fair price.” He rubbed his hands together as if he couldn’t wait to spend the new money. “It’s just time to sell, Lonnie, pure and simple.”

“I’m surprised, I never—”

“You’re right. Forty years in the business, from a mom-and-pop fruit stand to a company in five states with sixty million in sales last year. Hard to believe they’re throwing in the towel.” Troy was not the least bit convincing in his effort at sentiment. Lonnie knew why. He was a witless dunce, a rich kid who played golf every day while trying to project the image of a hard-charging, ass-kicking corporate honcho. His father and his uncle were selling now because in a few short years Troy would take the
reins and forty years of toil and prudence would get spent on racing boats and beach property.

There was a pause as Ben and Ken continued staring at Lonnie. One was in his mid-forties with a bad haircut and a pocket liner stuffed with cheap ballpoints. Maybe he was Ben. The other was a little younger, a slim-faced, executive type with better clothes and hard eyes. Lonnie looked at them, and it was obvious it was his turn to say something.

“Will this store be closed?” he asked, almost in defeat.

Troy jumped at the question. “In other words, what happens to you? Well, let me assure you, Lonnie, that I’ve said all the right things about you, all the truth, and I’ve recommended that you be kept here in the same position.” Either Ben or Ken nodded very slightly. Troy was reaching for his coat. “But that’s not my business anymore. I’m gonna step outside for a bit while you guys talk things over.” Like a flash, Troy was out of the room.

For some reason his departure brought smiles to Ken and Ben. Lonnie asked, “Do you guys have business cards?”

“Sure,” both said, and they pulled cards from pockets and slid them to the end of the table. Ben was the older, Ken the younger.

Ken was also in charge of this meeting. He began, “Just a bit about our company. We’re out of Charlotte, with eighty stores in the Carolinas and Georgia. SuperHouse is a division of Listing Foods, a conglomerate based in Scarsdale with about two billion in sales last year. A public company, traded on NASDAQ. You’ve probably heard of it. I’m Vice President for Operations for SuperHouse, Ben here is regional VP. We’re expanding south and west, and
Hadley Brothers looked attractive. That’s why we’re here.”

“So you’re keeping the store?”

“Yes, for now, anyway.” He glanced at Ben, as if there was a lot more to the answer.

“And what about me?” Lonnie asked.

They actually squirmed, almost in tandem, and Ben removed a ballpoint from his collection. Ken did the talking. “Well, you have to understand, Mr. Shaver—”

“Please call me Lonnie.”

“Sure, Lonnie, there are always shakeups along the line when acquisitions occur. Just part of the business. Jobs are lost, jobs are created, jobs are transferred.”

“What about my job?” Lonnie pressed. He sensed the worst and was anxious to get it over with.

Ken deliberately picked up a sheet of paper and gave the appearance of reading something. “Well,” he said, ruffling the paper, “you have a solid file.”

“And very strong recommendations,” Ben added helpfully.

“We would like to keep you in place, for now anyway.”

“For now? What does that mean?”

Ken slowly returned the paper to the table, and leaned forward on both elbows. “Let’s be perfectly candid, Lonnie. We see a future for you with our company.”

“And it’s a much better company than the one you’re with now,” Ben added, the tag-team working to perfection. “We offer higher salaries, better benefits, stock options, the works.”

“Lonnie, Ben and I are ashamed to admit that our company does not have an African-American in a
management position. We, along with our bosses, would like for this to change, immediately. We want it to change with you.”

Lonnie studied their faces, and suppressed a thousand questions. In the span of a minute, he’d gone from the brink of unemployment to the prospect of advancement. “I don’t have a college degree. There’s a limit to—”

“There are no limits,” Ken said. “You have two years of junior college, and, if necessary, you can finish your studies. Our company will cover the cost of college.”

Lonnie had to smile, as much from relief as from good fortune. He decided to proceed cautiously. He was dealing with strangers. “I’m listening,” he said.

Ken had all the answers. “We’ve studied the personnel at Hadley Brothers, and, well, let’s say most of the upper- and mid-management people will soon be looking for work elsewhere. We spotted you, and another young manager from Mobile. We’d like for both of you to come to Charlotte as soon as possible and spend a few days with us. You’ll meet our people, learn about our company, and we’ll talk about the future. I must warn you, though, you can’t spend the rest of your life here in Biloxi if you want to advance. You must be willing to move around.”

“I’m willing.”

“We thought so. When can we fly you up?”

The image of Lou Dell closing the door on them flashed before his eyes, and he frowned. He breathed deeply, and said with great frustration, “Well, I’m tied up in court right now. Jury duty. I’m sure Troy told you.”

Ken and Ben appeared to be confused by this. “It’s just a couple of days, isn’t it?”

“No. The trial’s scheduled for a month, and we’re in week two.”

“A month?” Ben asked, on cue. “What kind of trial is it?”

“The widow of a dead smoker is suing a tobacco company.”

Their reactions were almost identical and left no doubt how they personally felt about such lawsuits.

“I tried to get out of it,” Lonnie said in an effort to smooth things.

“A product liability suit?” Ken asked, thoroughly disgusted.

“Yeah, something like that.”

“For another three weeks?” Ben asked.

“That’s what they say. I can’t believe I got stuck,” he said, his words trailing away.

There was a long pause in which Ben opened a fresh pack of Bristols and lit one. “Lawsuits,” he said bitterly. “We get sued every week by some poor clod who trips and falls and then blames it on the vinegar or the grapes. Last month a bottle of carbonated water exploded at a private party in Rocky Mount. Guess who sold ’em the water? Guess who got sued last week for ten million? Us and the bottler. Product liability.” A long puff, then a quick chew on a thumbnail. Ben was steaming. “Gotta seventy-year-old woman in Athens claiming she wrenched her back when she allegedly reached up high to get a can of furniture polish. Her lawyer says she’s entitled to a coupla mill.”

Ken stared at Ben as if he wanted him to shut up, but Ben evidently exploded easily when the topic was broached. “Stinkin’ lawyers,” he said, smoke pouring from his nostrils. “We paid over three million last year for liability insurance, money just
thrown away because of all the hungry lawyers circling above.”

Ken said, “That’s enough.”

“Sorry.”

“What about the weekends?” Lonnie asked anxiously. “I’m free from Friday afternoon until late Sunday.”

“I was just thinking of that. Tell you what we’ll do. We’ll send one of our planes to get you Saturday morning. We’ll fly you and your wife to Charlotte, give you the grand tour of the home office, and we’ll introduce you to our bosses. Most of these guys work Saturdays anyway. Can you do it this weekend?”

“Sure.”

“Done. I’ll arrange the plane.”

“You sure there’s no conflict with the trial?” Ben asked.

“None that I can foresee.”

Ten

A
fter moving along with impressive punctuality, the trial hit a snag on Wednesday morning. The defense filed a motion to prohibit the testimony of Dr. Hilo Kilvan, an alleged expert from Montreal in the field of statistical summaries of lung cancer, and a small battle erupted over the motion. Wendall Rohr and his team were particularly enraged at the defense tactic; the defense so far had tried to bar the testimony of every plaintiff’s expert. Indeed, the defense had proved quite effective at delaying and attempting to bar everything for four years. Rohr insisted that Cable and his client were once again stalling, and he made an angry plea to Judge Harkin for the imposition of sanctions against the defense. The war over sanctions, with each side demanding monetary penalties from the other and the Judge so far denying same, had been raging almost since the initial suit was filed. As with most large civil cases, the subplot of sanctions often consumed as much time as the real issues.

Rohr ranted and stomped in front of the empty jury box as he explained that this latest motion by the defense was the seventy-first—“count ’em, seventy-one!”—to be filed by the tobacco company seeking to exclude evidence. “We’ve had motions to exclude evidence of other diseases caused by smoking, motions to prevent evidence of warnings, motions to prevent evidence of advertising, motions to exclude evidence of epidemiological studies and statistical theories, motions to preclude reference to patents not used by the defendant, motions to exclude evidence of subsequent or remedial measures taken by the tobacco company, motions to preclude our evidence of the testing of cigarettes, motions to strike portions of the autopsy report, motions to exclude addiction evidence, motions—”

“I’ve seen these motions, Mr. Rohr,” His Honor interrupted when it appeared as if Rohr might name them all.

Rohr hardly missed a beat. “And, Your Honor, in addition to the seventy-one—count ’em, seventy-one!—motions to exclude evidence, they’ve filed exactly eighteen motions for continuances.”

“I’m very much aware of this, Mr. Rohr. Please move along.”

Rohr walked to his cluttered table and was handed a thick brief by an associate. “And, of course, each defense filing is accompanied by one of these damned things,” he said loudly as he dropped the brief onto the table. “We don’t have time to read these, as you know, because we’re too busy preparing for trial. They, on the other hand, have a thousand lawyers billing by the hour and working even as we speak on another harebrained motion, which
will, no doubt, weigh six pounds and doubtless take up more of our time.”

“Can we get to the merits, Mr. Rohr?”

Rohr didn’t hear him. “Since we don’t have time to read these, Your Honor, we simply weigh them, and so our rather brief answer goes something like this: ‘Please allow this letter memorandum to serve as our response to the defendant’s four-and-a-half-pound, typically overdone brief in support of its latest frivolous motion.’ ”

With the jury out of the courtroom, smiles and manners and pleasant behavior were forgotten by everyone. The strain was evident on the faces of all the players. Even the clerks and the court reporter looked edgy.