Chapter 13

The notoriety Frank received in getting that large jury verdict resulted in two other plaintiff law firms asking Frank to represent them in specific cases. He told him he would think about doing that but that he enjoyed being a part-time lawyer, and he didn’t want to work full-time. They should contact him when they have a case they think Frank would be interested in, and he will tell them if he wants to get involved in that particular case.

Right now, he was more interested in being involved with Aria, and that was shown just about every fourth day when the boat she was time-sharing became available for her to use. It depended on the weather if they would use the boat to go fishing. More often than not, the weather cooperated, and they would go out into the gulf and fish.

Their efforts in fishing were for the most part successful, as they caught a variety of fish. Ken Bridges who was a friend and a conservation officer told them where the hot spots were, and that was a contributing factor in their fishing success. Smokey’s Smokehouse was visited quite often to smoke some of the caught fish.

Aria was all Frank had ever wanted in a wife. He acknowledged that he was blessed in having found and married her.

His law firm up north asking him to come back there to try a case was becoming a rare request. As far as he was concerned, that was fine with him. He did however, take Aria up north during the summer months in an attempt to get relief from the hot humid warm weather of Florida. There was a lot to see and places to visit that were interesting in this metropolitan city and its surrounding area.

Driving out into the surrounding countryside and other times to the bordering States had them both appreciate the many interesting places they saw. They chartered a boat and did some salmon fishing. Aria said some of the techniques they use for fishing for salmon and lake trout on Lake Michigan could be applied to fishing in Florida. She would talk to the members of her group about putting downriggers on the boat and maybe even using side planners.

Frank didn’t realize that all these interesting places they visited existed as he hadn’t made an effort to see these sites when he was growing up.

Being back in Florida had Frank periodically stopping by the law offices and taking Aria out to lunch. One time when he did this, the receptionist gave him a phone message. The message was from an attorney, Jay Dollar, who asked that Frank phone him about a case he could be interested in.

Frank returned the call to Jay. The lady who answered the call said this was the law firm of Krasner and Dollar and transferred the call to Jay.

Jay thanked Frank for returning his call. There was some brief small talk, but Jay quickly said why he called Frank. He said they had a case in which their client was injured. She was in a well-known hotel when a worker who was pushing a cart wasn’t looking where he was going. He pushed the cart into this lady knocking her to the ground. The lady fell, hitting her head and breaking her glasses, along with breaking her arm. At the hospital, after fixing the broken arm they became concerned with the possibility of the lady having a brain bleed because she was taking Eliquis to avoid having another DVT. Her two black eyes were a concern, but the two cat scans indicated there was no brain bleed.”

“The liability is clear since there is a video of this incident happening,” said Jay. “We have been offered 100k to settle which on the face of it seems fair if this incident happened in someone’s home. This however, happened in a hotel which is a deep pockets defendant. Our client doesn’t think it is a fair offer to settle and wants more. A lawsuit has been filed, and would you want to get involved and try this case?”

Frank gave it a quick thought and said he would come over and review the file before he would decide.

He mentioned this call to Aria and told her it had the possibility of him becoming a part-time lawyer again. She laughed, telling him it was more that he was becoming a gun-for-hire.

Frank did go to Jay’s office and, after reviewing the file and discussing it with Jay as to what his fee would be, said he would try the case. He spelled out what further needed to be done on the case.

Before he knew it, the case was prepped and set for trial. The offer was doubled to settle the case, which was relayed to the client who refused it, saying she wanted more. Frank spoke with the client and said the verdict could be more or it could be less. Letting a jury decide the amount was taking a gamble which is why most lawsuits are settled before trial. He recommended she accept the amount offered but the client was adamant and said she would let the jury decide.

It was a three-day trial. Frank gave his usual closing argument of asking the jury to put themselves or their loved ones in his client’s place and to award what they would want in the way of a settlement that they would consider to be fair. The defense attorney, who in Frank’s opinion was competent, said that 100k was a fair amount to be awarded.

While the defense attorney was good, he wasn’t that good in that the jury made an award of two million dollars. Frank mentally smiled to himself thinking his client was a better judge of claim values than he was. There was a little write-up in the local newspaper because of the amount of the verdict, along with a picture of Frank with his happy client.

Ben Palmer was reading the morning paper as he was eating breakfast. His plans for the day after he made a phone call to the office up north was to go to the golf course for his ten o’clock tee time. He read the short article on this verdict and recognized the name of the attorney.

“Hey Jodie, who do you think is practicing law down here? Take a guess.”

Jodie only knew one lawyer, which caused her to say, “You don’t mean Frank do you?”

“Yes I do,” and he handed her the newspaper to read the article and look at the picture of Frank with his client.

Later in the day, Jodie was having lunch with Karin Randell. Karin mentioned that she knew Frank’s client who received the large verdict that was reported in the paper. Jodie said that she was aware of who the attorney Frank Watkins was when she was up north. Jodie said Frank cheated on his wife, and when the wife found out what he was doing, she wanted a divorce. Frank put the screws to his wife in getting a fair divorce settlement. Jodie said it was his knowing the judge that enabled him to do this.