Law Monster
10-24-2004, 10:36 PM
When I first met Ferber, he worked for a large insurance defense firm. He was a prick. Even his own staff and co-workers did not like him. Though, in a wierd way he was fun to deal with and I liked him; just a little. What I liked is he was passionate about his case, even though his clients were rich pond scum.
I couldn't believe Ferber's firm when they entrusted a case easily worth $100K's, plus punitives, (my motion for discovery re likely to award punitives was even granted) to this young punk. But they did. :rolleyes: I ended up trying the case to a jury. One of the reasons I tried it was this young abrasive cocky kid against a sweet, good looking, :cool: honest lawyer like me did not have a chance. When they assigned a "litigation partner" to him who looked like scar face from Dick Tracy and acted like our case was a joke, and did nothing but smirk, we thought, yeah, we got them.
No, we got hosed. :eek: Not necessarily by them, but by the fat asshole attorney/politician jury foreman who mistakenly instructed the jury on "the law", the same commonly mistaken/assumed law we had fought hard to avoid being mentioned during trial, so we lost 99% of the case. (Luckily we had substantial settlements from other defendants so we still made money from the case.) One of the lessons I learned is motions in limine are not necessarily good, sometimes it is better to clearly explain why something is not to be considered so no one assumes that by the silence it is implied or common knowledge.
There were a few other last minute developments, all client or expert related, which did not help my case. But once we began trial, and the cats were out of the bag, there was not much left to do but damage control.
Anyway, even if my case went to shit I gave it my best shot. We destroyed Ferber's experts, I had one of my greatest cross-examinations to date. Things were rolling along, my case was now mostly about emotional distress when it was a property damage case, but so what. We were doing OK. I thought Ferber was ****ed. His "partner" was clueless as to the facts, and he laughed, smirked and came off as a typical snake lawyer. (His skin was pocked mark and a little reptilian :p ) , Ferber was the only guy that knew the case, and Scarface was not letting him do any examation. The jury seemed interested in our clients, a few seemed to flow, all was good. Then Ferber got his chance. My stupid ****ing expert refused to disclose how much money he made from all of the related litigation and just refused to simplify his testimony. We got Ferberized. Oh well.
Now, Ferber has left the dark side of insurance defense and is a plaintiff's PI lawyer. He has had a few maturing "life events" and I have run accross him a few times in the years since. I think he is well suited to PI plaintiff work because he really does have a passion for his clients.
If you don't believe in your clients, you can never try a case. I'm a little weird on that issue, I sit accross from the jury and try to use mental telepathy to send messages to the jury. I think it works, every jury (and probably most Judges) seem to like me, and usually my clients. So when I see an attorney who seems to really believe in his clients, and their cases, I wish them well, and they tend to do well.
I would be comfortable referring a PI case to Ferber, and would be very careful to try one against him. I wish him success!
I couldn't believe Ferber's firm when they entrusted a case easily worth $100K's, plus punitives, (my motion for discovery re likely to award punitives was even granted) to this young punk. But they did. :rolleyes: I ended up trying the case to a jury. One of the reasons I tried it was this young abrasive cocky kid against a sweet, good looking, :cool: honest lawyer like me did not have a chance. When they assigned a "litigation partner" to him who looked like scar face from Dick Tracy and acted like our case was a joke, and did nothing but smirk, we thought, yeah, we got them.
No, we got hosed. :eek: Not necessarily by them, but by the fat asshole attorney/politician jury foreman who mistakenly instructed the jury on "the law", the same commonly mistaken/assumed law we had fought hard to avoid being mentioned during trial, so we lost 99% of the case. (Luckily we had substantial settlements from other defendants so we still made money from the case.) One of the lessons I learned is motions in limine are not necessarily good, sometimes it is better to clearly explain why something is not to be considered so no one assumes that by the silence it is implied or common knowledge.
There were a few other last minute developments, all client or expert related, which did not help my case. But once we began trial, and the cats were out of the bag, there was not much left to do but damage control.
Anyway, even if my case went to shit I gave it my best shot. We destroyed Ferber's experts, I had one of my greatest cross-examinations to date. Things were rolling along, my case was now mostly about emotional distress when it was a property damage case, but so what. We were doing OK. I thought Ferber was ****ed. His "partner" was clueless as to the facts, and he laughed, smirked and came off as a typical snake lawyer. (His skin was pocked mark and a little reptilian :p ) , Ferber was the only guy that knew the case, and Scarface was not letting him do any examation. The jury seemed interested in our clients, a few seemed to flow, all was good. Then Ferber got his chance. My stupid ****ing expert refused to disclose how much money he made from all of the related litigation and just refused to simplify his testimony. We got Ferberized. Oh well.
Now, Ferber has left the dark side of insurance defense and is a plaintiff's PI lawyer. He has had a few maturing "life events" and I have run accross him a few times in the years since. I think he is well suited to PI plaintiff work because he really does have a passion for his clients.
If you don't believe in your clients, you can never try a case. I'm a little weird on that issue, I sit accross from the jury and try to use mental telepathy to send messages to the jury. I think it works, every jury (and probably most Judges) seem to like me, and usually my clients. So when I see an attorney who seems to really believe in his clients, and their cases, I wish them well, and they tend to do well.
I would be comfortable referring a PI case to Ferber, and would be very careful to try one against him. I wish him success!