DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE
Although Lewis Carroll was a mathematician, lawyers love his writings. Alice’s world of absurd characters and paradoxical declarations perfectly mirrors the arbitrary realm of “The Law.” In Wonderland, as in law, things are often so just because they are. Also in law, logic is subordinate to authority. For Alice, things were not always so strange. Once she was a normal girl in a normal world. It all changed when she fell down the rabbit hole. My life changed when I fell into that dot that divides Sex.Com precisely in twain. In chaos theory, they talk about “strange attractors,” vortices of force that generate order and disorder in equal shares. Like a force of myth or legend, Sex.Com distorts reality, makes all things believable and nothing incredible. Just to go after it was to join in a fabulous quest. Or so I thought.
It’s the intoxication of advocacy. When you are fully charged up, totally committed to the advocate’s role in an important case, the energy changes. The atmosphere will almost start to shimmer. You are speeding ahead, plying a sword that is both immensely heavy and totally maneuverable. You feel the enemy on the other side, as he parries your blow, and your opposed wills clash like ringing steel. The blades dance, you thrust, evade, lure his edge and seek the opportunity to strike. It’s a game you play for a living, and it feeds your body and soul. You identify with your victories, and each victory contains the energy you need to move on to the next one. Along the way, you make a living, but the victories themselves are worth far more than the money you’re paid.
And that’s my problem. I enjoy it so much I’ll practically do it for free. I’ve spent too much time treating cases like motorcycles that you can kick-start and tear ass all over the dirt in. I’ve come to see clients and witnesses as fuel to burn, weapons to deploy, and obstacles to be destroyed. Sex.Com was like a big, fire-breathing road rocket with 100,000 cc’s ready to blast off like a George Lucas creation hitting hyper-drive with the Empire in hot pursuit. God, I wanted to ride that thing, but it was dead stock still. In October 1999, Gary had no gas money. The time left to take discovery was ticking down, and Gary wasn’t doing much but getting behind on his legal bill, so two things had to happen. He had to find some money, a lot of it, and I had to find a way to make it until he did.
We came up with an agreement that hung on a big if. I would keep working on the case if he promised to pay me $55,000 when he got a few million bucks out of a stock IPO that he was sure would be happening within the next few months.
You can imagine what your wife says when you come home with one of these agreements. She’s like, “An IPO?” And you’re like, “Yeah, you can make a lot of money on them.” You reassure her that you’re not going to put another 500 hours into this case and have nothing but an unfulfilled promise to show for it. She squints her eyes and shakes her head with a tight smile on her pretty lips. I have a small collection of worthless agreements to show for lots of work done free, so this is a bit of a sore point with her.
But I had to go on. I was down the rabbit hole, where things just get “curiouser and curiouser.” It seemed curious enough to a lot of people when, just five months after I had moved to Carpinteria and put an Ojai address on my stationery, I was back in Medford, Oregon, renting office space with my old friend Peter Carini across from the courthouse. “So what about Ojai?” they would ask. The answer was always the same. I had a big case that I was working on now, and I needed to focus on it and keep costs down.
Peter thought I was crazy. He’d saunter into my office in his tailor-made suit, snugly buttoned over a custom shirt and matching tie, ask me about the case and act interested. But when his true feelings came out, he just shook his head and snorted. The whole thing was going to come to nothing, and it was sad because I was pouring my soul into it. Of course, he wouldn’t say this straight out, instead expressing disappointment that I wouldn’t throw in with him full-time in the criminal defense biz. Peter is the undisputed king of Southern Oregon DUI, with sights set on the statewide crown. With me handling drug cases, we would’ve been unstoppable. His disappointment was visible.
The office was a fun place. My daughter Maria, who had stayed in Oregon when the rest of us moved to California, was Peter’s secretary, so I got to spend time with her. I had an upstairs space with good sun from big windows to the north and west, and a nice view of the parking lot and the blue Oregon horizon. I could drink beer on the landing and look at the backside of the old courthouse. It got good sun from big windows to the north and west. I brought in my huge oak library table desk, set up the computer and my new three-in-one HP 3100 faxer, scanner, printer, a beast that is still in service to this day, and now, surely, I was ready for anything.
It was good to be around people, too, because even though they take up your time, they give you ideas. Also, the marveling tone of a couple of secretaries like Kim and Teresa can really make you feel smart, which feeds your desire to go engage in more exploits. Lee Werdell was a serious trial lawyer who had an associate named Sue Whatley, who was not good at getting up in the morning but liked to work late. We became good friends, and I started to give her small projects on the case. John Hanson loved to wander into my office and ask questions with this wide-eyed look, while poking through my mail. He was generous with his praise, telling me I was farsighted and this was all going to come in really big for me. He complained a bit about my excessive use of the fax paper, so I bought my own fax machine.
My office quickly took on the look of a paper nightmare. I had four Bekins boxes of documents from Katie Diemer’s copy of the file, an endless stream of works in progress, storms of paper coming from Dorband and Dolkas. I attached a satellite to the roof of the building for faster Internet access. Gary wanted to give me an even bigger dish that he planned on getting from Hughes Engineering as part of a consulting deal. Fortunately, I was able to simply transition to DSL. It was too much work, for too little money. But the New Economy was hitting on all cylinders. IPOs were blasting off everyday, like volleys of spaceships lighting up the sky, heading for new planets. I had a piece of that new world. I was reading Wired, surfing the Net, and talkin’ tech like nobody’s fool. I was filing papers, writing, talking and emailing like a son of a gun.
And then it happened. Gary became a millionaire. A company called Interwoven went public on October 8, 1999. Gary was in a position to cash in nearly immediately. Unlike many of the other stockholders, his holdings were not under any sale restriction, and thus could be sold immediately. That was great, because after an IPO, a lot of stocks spike up in value, but by the time the restrictions are lifted, they’ve taken a slide. Selling sooner is often better. But the transfer agents, the people who actually give you your stock, so you can turn it into money, weren’t cooperating. They didn’t like the idea that anyone wasn’t under sale restriction.
So I shook the money tree, calling the lawyers for the transfer agents, implying threat as politely as I could, while Gary played the crazy client. He would call up the transfer agents and threaten lawsuits. Then I would pick up the other end and apologize for my client’s untoward behavior, but emphasize that his frustration was understandable, given that his stock had no restriction and he should be allowed to sell it immediately. Dot-commers got away with murder in those days, so it was kind of like cleaning up after a bratty kid -- all smiles and apologies.
After about a week of heckling the transfer agents, the money broke loose for Gary, but as became our usual pattern, I then had to break my share loose from him. Gary wanted to pay me, but he also wanted me to promise to sue more people. I had some serious concerns about adding more defendants in the case. We had already sued a bank in the British Virgin Islands, and a bank officer, Andrew Keuls, but I had never served them with the lawsuit, so they had never appeared. I didn’t want more defendants appearing. Too many defendants make a case completely unmanageable, as more and more lawyers show up to beat up on the plaintiff’s lawyer. I couldn’t afford this risk, and drew the line. It would not be a good idea to seek to amend the complaint to allege more claims against new defendants. Gary almost fired me again, threatening right up to the line. I knew that if he fired me, I’d never get paid for the work I’d already done, which amounted to several hundred hours. It was like tying a rope to restrain an oil tanker that was gently drifting away. Gary was a millionaire now, and could have any lawyer he wanted. But we talked it through. The rope held. He wire transferred $55,000 to my account. Peter couldn’t believe it.
I could hear the jet fuel flowing into that big red road rocket with the 100,000 cc engine as I settled into the cockpit. I was surrounded by the armored embrace of an Internet war chariot. Scanning the instrument panel, all my weapons were available at a touch. The visor slowly lowered over my eyes, and through it I could see the beautiful designs of war, and in the corner of my vision, a clock pulsing down the months, weeks, days and minutes left to win the game. My hands rested firm on the controls as I and the whole machine gently became weightless.
It’s happening now. Judge Ware is clearing me for takeoff, thumbs up, wearing an aviator cap. Near the starting line, I see a young girl. Is it Alice, poised to drop her hanky, announcing the start of the contest? Do I hear Baby Sex.Com crying out for me to save her? Is that dragon Steve Cohen, oozing smoke, holding her captive? Is that Black Knight Bob Dorband? What’s that racket? Down at the end of the runway, frantically gesturing with her crown askew and her sceptre held high -- The Red Queen! No, it’s Gary screaming “Off with their heads! Off with their heads!” I’ve already hauled back on the throttle. I hurtle past Gary, past the dragon and Baby Sex.Com, then past Judge Ware’s smiling face as big as the sun as I clear the runway, watching the blue get bigger in front of me -- heading for the open sky.