Sherwood lowered his voice. This was the critical part. “We’ve spent millions perfecting the system. But to be frank, companies like yours can’t afford our services.”
Davids didn’t flinch, but he could tell he had her attention.
“We impanel mock juries who very closely mirror the actual juries. Other consulting firms know how to use shadow juries. But our jurors so closely track the real jurors that they’re more like clones. We hold mock trials with these jurors, working around the clock to predict the actual verdict days or even weeks before the real trial concludes. We sell our research to hedge fund operators and investment firms.”
Davids had stopped eating and Sherwood could see the look in her eyes, the dawning realization that this might be an asset she hadn’t considered before. A different league. What could be more valuable than the ability to predict exactly which jurors might be most sympathetic to her case?
But she was a tough negotiator who knew better than to act impressed. “And because you’re such a big fan of guns, you’re going to make an exception in this case,” Davids said, with a twinge of sarcasm. “For the meager sum of a half million or so, you’re going to tell us exactly which jurors to strike and which ones to keep.”
Sherwood smiled. “I already told you-you can’t afford us.”
“Then what’s your angle? Why this elaborate show?”
Sherwood got up and grabbed another beer from the refrigerator. “I want you to win,” he said. “I like your side of the debate. Plus, if I intend to make a lot of money on the case, I can’t afford to be surprised by the verdict.”
“Then let me put your mind at ease,” Davids said. She took another bite of her sandwich. Sherwood waited while she chewed. “We haven’t paid any plaintiffs yet. We don’t intend to start with Blake Crawford. We’ll win, Mr. Sherwood. You can put your money down right now.”
Robert Sherwood shook his head. “We ran three mock juries on that Indiana case that was headed to trial until Congress bailed you out with the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act. You would have lost nearly ten million. You haven’t paid anything yet, but only because you’ve never actually gone to trial in a case like this one.”
Sherwood watched the lines on Davids’s face tighten, the eyes narrow. She didn’t like hearing this, but he kept his voice steady, matter-of-fact. “Your high-priced lawyers and in-house counsel have lost almost every critical hearing this past year in the cases currently pending against you. So far, courts in New York, Indiana, and the state of Washington have either held the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act unconstitutional or found other ways around it. It’s just a matter of time before you have to start facing real juries on these cases where you’re allegedly indirectly supplying the black market, and our research is not encouraging.”
Davids finished her beer and wiped her mouth. “I’ve got enough people telling me how bad things are going,” she said, her words terse. “I’m fully aware that inner-city juries are just dying to tag a gun manufacturer like us with a huge verdict. It’s the American way, Mr. Sherwood. Everybody’s a victim. Sue the big, bad corporation. I didn’t really need to come all the way up here for the civics lesson.”
“I’ve got a solution,” Sherwood said. She gave him a don’t-we-all? look. “Wait,” he said, “hear me out.”
“My plane leaves in two and a half hours. It will take thirty minutes to get to the airport.”
“All right, let me get right to it.” Sherwood said. “Virginia Beach is a good town for a test case-it’s pretty conservative and mostly Republican. But there’s not much of a gun culture there. You need a different type of lawyer to handle this case. Somebody young. Somebody who doesn’t fit the stereotype. Somebody who can relate to a Virginia Beach jury.”
“And I suppose you have just the person?”
“He’s the best young trial lawyer I’ve ever seen. I had to release him from our program because he was too good-skewing the results. He would win cases that most of us thought were unwinnable.”
Sherwood could tell from the look on her face that Davids was not buying it. “I’ve already got plenty of lawyers,” she said. “And I need true believers, not somebody who, as you say, ‘goes against stereotype.’”
“Humor me,” Sherwood said. “Just spend fifteen minutes watching this kid on tape.”
Davids put up some initial resistance but ultimately agreed. They went to a flat-screen television hanging on the wall, where Sherwood had the highlight film ready to go-portions of an opening statement, Jason on cross- examination, a slice of Jason’s best closing argument. Sherwood provided running commentary, explaining that Davids could use her in-house lawyer to drive the overall strategy and Jason to try the case.
“This kid is magic with a jury,” Sherwood reiterated. “You can teach him how to use guns, why they’re important. Someone like Jason who is less immersed in the gun culture will be better at explaining those concepts to the jury in a way they can understand.”
Davids looked like she was thinking about it, so Sherwood pressed his point. “He’s licensed in Virginia, and you need someone young. Kelly Starling is young and fresh and easy on the eyes. You think that’s a coincidence? The handgun-control folks know that men typically go our way.
“On the other hand, our preliminary research shows that young women would typically be sympathetic to a victim like Blake Crawford. Jason could help win over that demographic.”
Davids nodded a little and seemed to relax. “I’ll think about it.” She was silent for a moment, then asked, “Why would you own a Russian SKS?” She motioned toward to one of the guns in Sherwood’s collection. “It’s a piece of junk.”
“It was a gift,” Sherwood explained. “I haven’t fired it more than twice since I got it.”
Davids seemed to accept this and turned the conversation to hunting. She didn’t leave until two hours later, flying south on Sherwood’s private plane. On the return trip, Sherwood’s pilot called and shared some good news.
“She contacted her company lawyer and asked him to do a background check on Jason Noble,” the pilot said.
When Robert Sherwood hung up the phone, he poured himself a glass of scotch and water. Before he went to bed, he stepped back into his gun room and looked around at his trophy kills hanging from the walls, the pictures of Sherwood and his hunting buddies, the guns that had brought him so much pleasure.
Until the day his daughter died.
Just prior to his meeting with Davids, he had thought about putting away the hunting pictures but decided against it. They added so much authenticity to the room. Besides, he hadn’t changed that much in five years. Davids apparently hadn’t noticed that there were no recent pictures.
He turned off the light and locked the door. The details he had learned about his daughter’s violent death flashed through his mind. He would pour himself another drink before he called it a night.
18
He was only six weeks into private practice, and Jason Noble was already tired of the grind. He loved the practice of law; he just didn’t have time for it. He had become Jason Noble, office manager, rather than Jason Noble, trial lawyer. He kept telling himself things would be different once he put all the systems in place.
At least he had a sweet office space. Sherwood had strongly suggested that Jason secure a Class A space on Main Street. “Nobody wants a lawyer who can’t afford a Main Street address.” Jason initially protested, calculating the cash flow he would need until serious fees started rolling in.
Sherwood wiped out that objection with one phone call.
“You’ve got a hundred-thousand-dollar line of credit with Bank of America,” he said when he called back. “You can probably double that after six months if you make your payments on time.”
At first, $100,000 seemed like a lot of money. Six weeks later, Jason had already burned through half of it. An interior designer (another of Sherwood’s suggestions) cost $5,000; office and conference room furniture was $15,000; computers and software another $5,000; a lawyer to incorporate, insurance, an independent bookkeeper, a cleaning crew, etc., etc. For the first two weeks, it seemed that the only legal work Jason did was negotiating contracts with vendors. During his third week, he started interviewing assistants and opened his first legal file.
Jason spent the next few weeks trying to learn the procedures in the criminal courts in and around Richmond. As promised, Sherwood delivered a few major cases to Jason’s door, all dealing with hair-testing evidence. Three more cases came as referrals from Dr. Patricia Rivers, the commonwealth’s former chief forensic toxicologist. By
