Authors: Larry D. Thompson
The six riders stopped on the highway at the edge of the dirt road.
Whizmo sized up the situation. “We got to leave our bikes here. Who’s got a gun for me?”
Five bikers unlocked saddlebags and each handed a gun to Whizmo. “Thanks, guys, but one’s enough,” Whizmo said as he selected a Glock. “You guys spread out in the woods. I’ll be the decoy. I’ll walk down the road and get their attention. They could recognize me, but I doubt it,” he said as he pulled a baseball cap from his rear pocket and pulled it down low over his face.
Whizmo waited a few minutes to give the others a chance to get through the woods. Then he began to shuffle as he walked, appearing to be an old man who lost his way. He rounded a bend in the road and saw the cabin. The Lincoln was parked beside it. Two goons were sitting on a small front porch, smoking and talking.
One of them pointed at Whizmo. “Hey, look here. We got a visitor.”
Whizmo’s imitation of an old man was so convincing that neither of them rose as he approached.
“Hey, old man, you make a wrong turn?”
“Yes, suh. Looks like I surely did. I was looking for Ms. Appleton’s place. May be I turned one road too soon. I surely do apologize if I disturbed you fine gentlemen.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Whizmo saw Monkey coming around the corner of the house, gun in hand. One of the men saw his glance and turned to see Monkey at the edge of the porch. He went for his gun, but before he could get it from his shoulder holster, Monkey shot him in the leg. His partner saw what was happening and lunged at Whizmo just as Whizmo pulled the Glock from its place in the small of his back.
“You hold it right there!” Whizmo yelled. “Your buddy got it in the leg. I figure I can put a slug right between your eyes from this range.”
The big man stopped at the edge of the porch when he saw the gun and then glanced around to see five other guns pointed at him. He slowly raised his hands over his head. “Okay, you got me.” He nodded toward his friend, who was writhing in pain on the floor. “Can someone help him?”
“Not yet,” Whizmo said. “Where’s the boy?”
“Listen, we didn’t hurt him. Weren’t going to. Just trying to scare his old lady.”
“You’re working for Kingsbury, right?”
“Don’t know no Kingsbury, man.”
Whizmo walked to the edge of the porch and pointed his gun at the kidnapper’s right eye. The big man flinched. “Now that I’ve got your attention, let me ask that question once more. You’re working for Kingsbury, right?”
The man’s eyes darted from gun to gun and back to Whizmo. “Yeah, it’s Kingsbury.”
“Now, you play ball with us and we’ll try not to put a hole in you. The boy inside?”
The kidnapper nodded.
“Monkey, frisk them, and someone put a belt around that guy’s leg above the wound. Looks like Monkey hit an artery. I’m going inside.”
Whizmo stepped around the kidnappers and entered the cabin, where he found Josh tied to a chair with duct tape on his mouth. “Josh, this may hurt just a little,” Whizmo said as he pulled the tape off.
“Whiz, how’d you ever find me?”
“Long story, son. Let’s get these ropes off you. We’ll use them to tie up those guys on the porch. I’ll have my buddies hang around until the cops get here. We’re going back to the highway and head home to San Marcos. There’s a general store a few miles away. We’ll buy you a shirt and some flip-flops. Your mama’s been worried.”
Luke returned to his seat. “Now, Doctor, we’re going to a different subject.”
Brad put up a document titled “Alfred Kingsbury Expense Account.”
Kingsbury leaped from his chair. “Where did you get that? I demand you take it off the screen. It’s private. If you hacked into our server I’ll have the federal prosecutors on you.”
Metcalf had given up objecting and said nothing. The judge said, “Order, order! Dr. Kingsbury, please take your seat.”
Kingsbury sat down, his face red and looking like he could have a stroke at any minute.
Luke turned to Brad. “Mr. McCoy, please put up that clip from Dr. Boatwright’s deposition.” Momentarily, Boatwright appeared on the screen, swearing that his relationship with Dr. Kingsbury was strictly professional and he had never received anything of value from Ceventa, and further that it would be improper to do so. When the clip ended, Luke turned back to Kingsbury.
“You told the jury about how you have to keep your distance from the FDA, but here’s an entry where you spent about twenty-five thousand dollars to take Dr. Boatwright and his wife on a junket to Jamaica.”
“That was business, sir.”
“A week at the Montego Bay Ritz-Carlton, nice business. And all of these lunches and after-work drinks with Dr. Boatwright, business, too? In fact, Dr. Kingsbury,” Luke demanded, “you and Dr. Boatwright have both lied under oath, haven’t you?”
Kingsbury, his confidence gone, could only nod.
Judge Nimitz interrupted. “Dr. Kingsbury, you must give a verbal answer.”
Kingsbury turned to look at the judge. “Your Honor, I can’t speak for Dr. Boatwright, but I’m trying to give truthful answers.”
Several jurors shook their heads in disagreement.
Often in a trial there is a turning point when a seasoned trial lawyer knows that he has the case won. Luke looked at the jury and concluded he had reached that point with Ceventa and Kingsbury. Still, he continued. He wanted to destroy Kingsbury.
“And right here among all of these entries involving Dr. Boatwright is an entry that documents two wire transfers, one for five hundred thousand dollars and another more recent one for two hundred thousand, to a numbered Swiss bank account with the notation of ‘Government Relations.’ You have a lot of business in Switzerland, Dr. Kingsbury?”
“No, sir. We sell our drugs to pharmacies and hospitals there. That’s all. It’s a small country.”
“So, Doctor, those transfers totaling seven hundred thousand dollars went to Roger Boatwright, the head of CDER, to buy his approval of Exxacia, didn’t it?”
Kingsbury mumbled something.
“We can’t hear you, Dr. Kingsbury. Why don’t you look at the jury and tell them the truth for once?”
By now Kingsbury was leaning forward, his arms resting on his knees as he stared at his new black shoes. He looked up and replied, “Sir, I don’t know anything about those transfers or how they got on my expense account.”
Again Luke looked at the jury and found them to be staring at the witness with disbelief.
“And one more entry, another wire transfer to a bank account in Maryland for twenty-five thousand dollars. Is it a coincidence that transfer took place on the same day that Ryan Sinclair’s body was found?”
Kingsbury looked at his lawyer, who was now staring out the window. Then he noticed the bailiff had left his desk close to the judge and had taken a position at the courtroom door, his right hand resting on his holstered weapon. Finally he responded in a barely audible voice, “Must be, Mr. Vaughan.”
“Well, we’ll see later. I’m sure the authorities can track down who that was wired to. Dr. Kingsbury, isn’t it a fact that once Exxacia was promoted in other countries, the adverse event reports, particularly those involving liver failure and death, started to rise at an alarming level?”
Kingsbury straightened up in the witness chair. “I wouldn’t call it an alarming level, but they have risen. We have a team investigating.”
Luke nodded at what appeared to be a semitruthful answer and continued. “Doctor, I’m handing you the most recent adverse event data available from the FDA’s Web site on Exxacia. I printed it this morning. In this country, in spite of your claimed success with millions of prescriptions, there are only five reports of adverse events. You know it’s a violation of federal law, but you directed Rudy Kowalski to hold those reports back, didn’t you?”
Kingsbury turned to the jury. “No, ladies and gentlemen, I did no such thing.”
Knowing that he had Kingsbury on the run, Luke bluffed. “Brad, please put up that memo from Dr. Kingsbury to Dr. Kowalski.”
Brad masked a smile as he reached for a blank sheet of paper and pretended to be adjusting the overhead before displaying the memo. Kingsbury interrupted. “Now that I think about it, I do believe I issued a memo early on in the production of the drug. It was probably interpreted that way.”
The courtroom was silent when the back door opened. Luke looked around to see Whizmo escorting Josh and Sue Ellen in. Luke leaped to his feet and started toward them. Kingsbury wanted to run but knew he couldn’t. The judge sized up the situation and ordered an immediate recess.
At the end of the recess Sue Ellen walked up to Luke’s counsel table. “Luke, Josh is safe. Now finish kicking Kingsbury’s butt.”
Luke nodded. “We got one of our kids back. Now I aim to save the other one.”
When the judge called the court back to order and the jury returned, Metcalf thought that Luke had to be finished. How much more damage could he do? She thought she had smooth sailing, and then her ship took a fatal blow to the bow just when the port was in sight. Luke had one more memo.
“Brad, if you please.” As the memo appeared, all of the jurors as well as the judge studied it. “Another memo from Dr. Sinclair, correct, Dr. Kingsbury?”
“Appears to be, sir.”
“It’s an e-mail directed to Boatwright and copying you. It says, ‘I demand that this clinical trial be stopped immediately. Otherwise more lives will be lost.’”
“I see that, sir. By then we had decided that Sinclair was a troublemaker. That was confirmed by Dr. Boatwright.”
“Troublemaker, Dr Kingsbury?” Luke asked, astonishment in his voice. “Not fifteen minutes ago, when we were talking about Dr. Sinclair’s death, you described him as a fine young doctor. Which is it? Or maybe the fact that he was a troublemaker had something to do with his death?”
Now most of the jurors nodded along with Luke.
Kingsbury searched for the right answer. “I misspoke when I said he was a troublemaker. We must have had some other reason for rejecting his recommendation.”
“In any case, Dr. Kingsbury, it was a lucky break for you and Ceventa that Dr. Sinclair is no longer with us.”
“Objection, Your Honor,” Metcalf said. “Argumentative.”
“Withdraw the question, Your Honor. And you see the date on this memo. It’s six weeks before Samantha Vaughan became a subject in your trial. If you had followed Dr. Sinclair’s recommendation, the trial would have been stopped and my daughter would never have received the drug.”
“I suppose if your dates are correct, that would be true.”
“And if you had heeded Dr. Sinclair’s advice, Samantha wouldn’t be dying of liver failure?”
Kingsbury slumped in his chair, ran his hand nervously through his hair, and replied, “I suppose that’s possible.”
Luke looked at the jury and concluded he had completed his mission. “I’m finished with this witness,” he said, disgust dripping from every word.
Metcalf stared at the clock on the wall and watched a minute tick off. Even as a seasoned trial lawyer she could think of no way she could rehabilitate her client. Finally she rose and said, “No questions, and Ceventa rests.”
The judge looked at the jury, but before he could say anything, Luke rose. “Your Honor, at this time we are dismissing our case against Dr. Challa, and we have one very short witness in rebuttal. We recall Dr. Salazar.”
When Dr. Salazar took the stand, Luke directed Brad to display the last memo from Ryan Sinclair. “Dr. Salazar, if you had seen this memo where Dr. Sinclair demands that the Exxacia clinical trial be stopped to save lives, would your committee have approved the drug for marketing in the United States?”
Dr. Salazar studied the memo and then said, “Absolutely not, Mr. Vaughan!”
Luke rose to his feet and buttoned his coat. “At this time plaintiff Samantha Vaughan closes.”
The next morning the courtroom was overflowing with reporters, college students, and lawyers. The jury took their seats, followed by the judge. Sue Ellen had returned to her chair beside Luke. The courtroom was silent as they waited for the judge to call for closing arguments. Then there was a squeak of the hallway door as it opened. Every eye turned to watch as Samantha was wheeled into the courtroom by Brad. Whizmo followed behind. Luke held the swinging door behind the counsel tables open as Brad pushed Samantha to a place beside Luke’s table.
“Judge, ladies and gentlemen, I’d like to introduce my daughter, Samantha.”
Samantha had asked Mary to take in her favorite blue dress with yellow flowers so that it fit her much smaller frame. She had carefully applied her makeup and had her hair in a ponytail. Samantha smiled at the jury and got thirteen smiles in return. One man in the back row gave her a thumbs-up sign.
“Mr. Vaughan, you may begin,” Judge Nimitz said.
Luke walked to the jury box. He had no notes. He didn’t need them. He had been thinking about this moment from the day they sued Ceventa. “Ladies and gentlemen, I rise to speak for my daughter.” He paused and looked at each of the jurors. “I also rise to speak for all of you, and for you, Judge, and even you, Ms. Metcalf. What you have seen over the past two weeks is the product of a carefully crafted system gone bad. The Food and Drug Administration was established to protect each of us from dangerous drugs. Instead, over the years, the drug companies developed an incestuous relationship with the FDA that was so strong that the upper management of the FDA forgot their mission and began to look at the giant pharmaceutical companies as their clients. The connection has become so strong that whatever the drug companies want, the FDA makes sure they get.
“We, you and I and Samantha, can sever that connection, and we can get Exxacia off the market. We’ve got enough antibiotics that don’t kill people. Why do we need to risk death to clear up our sinuses?
“How do we do this? You have to return a verdict big enough to resonate throughout the country, all the way to Washington, Silver Spring, and, yes, even to Copenhagen. It’s certain that Ceventa and the FDA knew Exxacia was dangerous, and what happened to Samantha could have been prevented. Ceventa is clearly responsible for Sam’s condition, and you should so find. As to her actual damages, I’ll leave it in your hands. Last, you’ve been asked to consider punitive damages against Ceventa for their conscious indifference to Samantha and to the citizens of this country. If you make the number big enough, they’ll get the message. Thank you.”
Luke looked each one of the jurors in the eye and turned to hug Samantha before he sat down.
Audrey Metcalf rose, thanked the jury for their service, and in a monotone went through all of the evidence that she had presented to show the good side of Ceventa and Exxacia. Clearly her spirit was shattered, and the jury could feel it.