Crisis (11 page)
The deposition had taken place in Randolph's posh 50 State Street office with its stunning view over Boston Harbor. Initially, Tony had been reasonable, not quite pleasant but certainly not confrontational. That was the playground entertainer persona. He'd even persisted in cracking a few off-the-record jokes, although only the court reporter had giggled. But the entertainer persona soon disappeared, to be replaced by the bully. As he began to hammer and accuse, about Craig's professional and private life in humiliating detail, Craig's weak defenses began to crumble. Randolph objected when he could, even tried to suggest recess at several junctures, but Craig had gotten to the point where he would not hear of it. Despite being warned against anger, Craig had gotten angry, very angry, and then proceeded to violate all of Randolph's admonitions and ignore all recommendations. The worst exchange happened in the early afternoon of the second day. Even though Randolph had again warned Craig about losing control during lunch and Craig had promised to follow his advice, Craig quickly fell into the same trap under the onslaught of Tony's preposterous allegations.
"Wait a second!" Craig had snapped. "Let me tell you something."
"Please," Tony had retorted. "I'm all ears."
"I've made some mistakes in my professional life. All doctors have. But Patience Stanhope was not one of them! No way!"
"Really?" Tony had questioned superciliously. "What do you mean by 'mistakes'?"
"I think it wise if we take a break here," Randolph had said, trying to intervene.
"I don't need a goddamned break," Craig shouted. "I want this asshole to understand just for a second what it's like to be a doctor: to be the one right there in the front-line trenches with sick people as well as hypochondriacs."
"But our goal is not to educate Mr. Fasano," Randolph had said. "It doesn't matter what he believes."
"Mistakes are when you do something stupid," Craig had said, ignoring Randolph and leaning forward to get his face closer to Tony's, "like cutting a corner when you're exhausted and have ten more patients to see, or forgetting to order a test when you know it's indicated because you had an intervening emergency."
"Or like making a stupid house call instead of meeting a seriously ill patient who was struggling to breathe at the hospital so you could get to the symphony on time?"
The sound of the outer men's room door slamming brought Craig back to the present. Hoping his lower intestine would stay quiescent for the rest of the morning, he finished up, pulled on his suit jacket, and went out to wash his hands. As he did so, he looked at himself in the mirror. He winced at his reflection. His appearance now was markedly worse than it had been before he started at the gym, and he didn't see much chance for improvement in the near future with the trial just getting under way. It was going to be a long, stressful week, especially considering his disastrous performance at his deposition. Immediately after the debacle, he hadn't needed Randolph to tell him how miserably he'd performed, although Randolph was gracious enough merely to suggest that they needed to practice prior to his testifying at the trial. Before Craig had left Randolph's office that day Craig had pulled Randolph aside and looked him in the eye. "There is something I want you to know," he'd said insistently. "I have made mistakes, as I told Fasano, even though I've tried my damnedest to be a good doctor. But I didn't make a mistake with Patience Stanhope. There was no negligence."
"I know," Randolph had said. "Believe me, I understand your frustration and your pain, and I promise you no matter what, I'll do my best to convince the jury of the same."
Back in the courtroom, Craig regained his seat. The voir dire had been completed and the jury impaneled. Judge Davidson was giving them some initial instructions, including making certain their cell phones were off and explaining the civil procedure they were about to witness. He told them that they and they alone were to be the triers of fact in the case, meaning they would be deciding the factual issues. At the end of the trial, he said he would charge them with the appropriate points of law, which was his bailiwick. He thanked them again for their service before looking over his spectacles at Tony Fasano.
"Plaintiff ready?" Judge Davidson asked. He had already told the jury that the proceedings would start with the plaintiff attorney making his opening statement.
"One moment, Your Honor," Tony said. He leaned over and conversed in a whisper with his assistant, Ms. Relf. She nodded while she listened, and then handed him a stack of note cards.
During the brief delay, Craig tried to begin engaging the jury as Randolph had recommended by regarding each in turn, hoping for eye contact. As he did so he hoped that his expression did not reflect his inner thoughts. For him the concept that this disparate, mixed bag of laypeople represented his peers seemed ludicrous at best. There was a nonchalant firefighter in a spotless white T-shirt with bulging muscles. There was a clutch of house-wives who appeared to be electrified about the whole experience. There was a blue-haired retired schoolteacher who looked like everybody's image of a grandmother. An overweight plumber's assistant in jeans and dirty T-shirt had one foot propped up on the front rail of the jury box. Next to him, in sharp contrast, was a well-dressed young man with a scarlet pocket square spilling out of the breast pocket of a tan linen jacket. A prim female nurse of Asian extraction was next, with her hands folded in her lap. Next were two struggling small-businessmen in polyester suits who clearly looked bored, as well as irritated at having been coerced into their civic duty. A considerably more well-to-do stockbroker was in the back row, directly behind the businessmen.
Craig felt a mounting despair as his eyes went from each individual juror to the next. Except for the Asian nurse, none were willing to make eye contact even briefly. He couldn't help but feel that there was little chance any of these people, save for the nurse, could have any idea of what it was like being a doctor in today's world. And when he combined that realization with his performance during his deposition, and with Leona's expected testimony and the plaintiff's experts' testimony, chances for a successful outcome seemed distant at best. It was all very depressing, yet a fitting end to a horrid eight months of anxiety, grief, isolation, and insomnia, engendered by his constant mental replaying of the whole affair. Craig was aware that the experience had affected him deeply, robbing him of his self-confidence, his sense of justice, his self-esteem, even his passion for practicing medicine. As he sat there looking at the jurors, he wondered, irrespective of the outcome, if he would ever be able to be the doctor he had once been.
2
BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS MONDAY, JUNE 5, 2006 10:55 A.M.
Tony Fasano gripped the edges of the podium as if he were at the controls of a mammoth video game. His pomaded, slicked-back hair had an impressive sheen. The large diamond in his gold ring flashed as it caught the sunlight. His gold-nugget cuff links were in full view. Despite his relatively short stature, his boxy build gave him a formidable appearance and his robust, swarthy complexion gave him a look of health despite the courtroom's sallow-colored walls.
After hiking a tasseled loafer onto the podium's brass rail, he began his opening statement: "Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I want to express my personal appreciation of your service to allow my client, Jordan Stanhope, his day in court."
Tony paused to glance back at Jordan, who remained impassive and motionless, as if he were a mannequin. He was dressed impeccably in a dark suit with a sawtooth white handkerchief peeking out of his breast pocket. His manicured hands were folded in front of him, his countenance expressionless.
Facing around, Tony regained eye contact with the jurors. His face assumed the expression of the bereft. "Mr. Stanhope has been in deep mourning, barely able to function after the regrettable, unexpected passing nine months ago of his lovely, dutiful wife and life's companion, Patience Stanhope. It was a tragedy that needn't have happened, and it wouldn't have happened except for the disgraceful negligence and malpractice of my opposing counsel's client, Dr. Craig M. Bowman."
Craig reflexively stiffened. Randolph's fingers promptly wrapped themselves around Craig's forearm, and he leaned toward the doctor. "Control yourself!" he whispered.
"How can that bastard say that?" Craig whispered back. "I thought that was what this trial is about."
"It is indeed. He's permitted to state the allegation. I do admit he's being inflammatory. Regrettably, that is his reputed style."
"Now," Tony said, pointing ceilingward with an extended index finger, "before I provide you good folks with a road map of how I will substantiate what I've just said, I'd like to make a confession about myself. I didn't go to Harvard like my esteemed opposing colleague. I'm just a city boy from the North End, and sometimes I don't talk that great."
The plumber's assistant laughed openly, and the two polyester suits cracked smiles despite their apparent pique.
"But I try," Tony added. "And if you're a little nervous about being here, understand that I am, too."
The three housewives and the retired schoolteacher smiled at Tony's unexpected admission.
"Now, I'm going to be up-front with you good people," Tony continued. "Just like I've been with my client. I've not done a lot of malpractice work. In fact, this is my first case."
The muscular firefighter now smiled and nodded approval of Tony's candor.
"So you might be asking yourself: Why did this wop take the case? I'll tell you why: to protect you and me and my kids from the likes of Dr. Bowman."
Mild expressions of surprise registered on most of the jurors' faces as Randolph rose up to his full, patrician height. "Your Honor, I must object. Counsel is being inflammatory."
Judge Davidson regarded Tony over the tops of his glasses with a mixture of irritation and surprise. "Your comments are pushing the limits of courtroom decorum. This is an arena for verbal combat, but established rites and rules are to be followed, especially in my courtroom. Do I make myself clear?"
Tony raised both beefy hands above his head in supplication. "Absolutely, and I apologize to the court. The problem is, occasionally my emotions get the better of me, and this is one of those cases."
"Your Honor ..." Randolph complained, but he didn't finish. The judge waved for him to sit while ordering Tony to proceed with appropriate propriety.
"This is fast becoming a circus," Randolph whispered as he took his seat. "Tony Fasano is a clown, but a deviously clever clown."
Craig regarded the attorney. It was the first time he'd seen a crack in the man's glacial aplomb. And his comment was disturbing. There was a definite element of reluctant admiration.
After a brief glance at his cards in the crook of the lectern's top, Tony returned to his opening statement: "Some of you might wonder why cases like this aren't settled by learned judges and accordingly question why you have to interrupt your lives. I'll tell you why. Because you have more common sense than judges." Tony pointed at each juror in term. He had their full attention. "It's true. With all due respect, Your Honor," Tony said, looking up at the judge. "Your memory banks are jammed full of laws and statutes and all sorts of legal mumbo jumbo, whereas these people" -- he redirected his attention to the jury -- "are capable of seeing the facts. In my book this is an absolute maxim. If I ever get into trouble, I want a jury. Why? Because you people, with your common sense and your intuitional ability, can see through the legal haze and tell where the truth lies."
Several of the jurors were now nodding agreement, and Craig felt his pulse quicken and a cramp grip his lower bowels. His fear about Tony connecting with the jury was seemingly already coming to pass. It was indicative of the whole sorry affair. Just when he felt things couldn't get any worse, they did.
"What I'm going to do," Tony continued, gesticulating with his right hand, "is to prove to you four basic points. Number one: By the doctor's own employees, I am going to show that Dr. Bowman owed a duty to the deceased. Number two: With the testimony of three recognized experts from three of our own area's renowned institutions, I will show you what a reasonable doctor would do in the circumstance the deceased found herself in the evening of the fifth of September, 2005. Number three: With the testimony of the plaintiff, of one of the doctor's employees, and of one of the experts who happened to be involved in the actual case, I will show you how Dr. Bowman negligently failed to act as a reasonable doctor would have acted. And number four: how Dr. Bowman's conduct was the proximate cause of the patient's sad death. That's it in a nutshell."
Perspiration appeared on Craig's forehead, and his throat felt suddenly dry; he needed to use the restroom, but he didn't dare. He poured himself some water from a pitcher in front of him with an embarrassingly shaky hand and took a drink.
"Now we are back on terra firma," Randolph whispered. He obviously was not as moved as Craig, which was some consolation. But Craig knew there was more.
"What I have just outlined," Tony continued, "is the core of a garden-variety case of medical malpractice. It's what the fancy, expensive lawyers like my opponent like to call the 'prima facie' case. I call it the core, or the guts. A lot of lawyers, like a lot of doctors, have a fondness to use words nobody understands, particularly Latin words. But this isn't a garden-variety case. It's much worse, and that's why I feel so strongly about it. Now, the defense is going to want you to believe, and they have witnesses to suggest, that Dr. Bowman is this great, compassionate, charitable doctor with a picture-perfect nuclear family, but the reality is far different."