Attorneys in State Farm Suits Barred for Payments to Witnesses

[WSJ_law_blog]

Manic Mississippi Monday is rapidly approaching. That’s March 31, the start-date of the trial for Dickie Scruggs.

For all those new to the story, or for all those old readers wondering how Scruggs may have gotten himself into into this situation, check out this page-one WSJ story today. For earlier posts on L’Affaire Scruggs, click here.

This situation is this: Scruggs has been accused of conspiring to bribe a Mississippi judge in a lawsuit involving a fee-dispute with former cohorts. But it’s not the first fee-dispute of Scruggs’s career. Far from it. For years, he battled two former colleagues from his asbestos days, and after his mammoth tobacco wins of the late 1990s, he squabbled with a handful of folks over fees.

Some, like Alwyn Luckey and Roberts Wilson, fought him tooth-and-nail. Others, like Pete Johnson and Michael T. Lewis, opted for less litigious routes. I “decided I’d rather spend whatever time I have alive at peace and not in court fighting for money,” explained Johnson, who cliams that Scruggs promised him 10% of the legal fees from big tobacco, then reneged.

Scruggs declined to comment on the story. But his lawyer, John Keker, says that in many instances, the fault lies elsewhere. “In these situations people want more money,” he told teh WSJ. “Flies come around buzzing and think that their contribution is more than it is.”