---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Mon, 22 May 2000 07:34:32 -0400
From: Peter McBride <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
News: Local
Attorney for Davidians well connected with Washington leadership
By MARK ENGLAND Tribune-Herald staff writer Mike Caddell's
commute to work takes all of a couple of minutes, if the signal
light is working.
He lives at the Four Seasons, one of Houston's premier hotels.
His law firm across the street occupies a corner of the 10th
floor at Park Shops Mall, with a luxury-suite view of Enron
Field, the Astros' new ballpark, and sports a gallery for the art
collection of Caddell and his wife, Cynthia Chapman, a partner in
Caddell & Chapman.
A portrait of President Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore
hugs a wall outside his office.
Caddell has been invited to the White House almost a dozen times
in the '90s because of his status as a major donor to the
Democratic Party. In 1996, for example, Caddell gave $111,000 to
the Clinton-Gore ticket.
Lined up on a counter underneath the portrait are stacks of bound
documents, part of the discovery for next month's wrongful-death
lawsuit filed by surviving Branch Davidians. Evidence in the case
is stored wherever space can be found. It's even on exhibit on
the floor of the gallery.
Caddell, a rich insider, is the lead plaintiffs' attorney in the
lawsuit against the federal government.
"One reason we've been successful so far is because we are
different from most people pressing this issue," said Caddell,
45. "We are the establishment in many respects. We have
credibility. We have resources. We're not on the fringe. We're
not willing to pursue outrageous allegations. People have been
willing to give this case a second look because we're involved.
We're not cause lawyers running from one cause to the next."
He sees no conflict in suing the administration of a president he
helped elect.
"Contrary to the popular belief of some people, I've never seen a
shred of evidence that Bill Clinton had any significant
involvement in what happened at Mount Carmel," Caddell said.
"Everything we've seen clearly shows the decision-making centered
in the FBI leadership and, ultimately, with Janet Reno. I don't
have a problem going after Reno. I think history will show that
she's one of the worst attorney generals the United States ever
had."
Caddell, lean and with a frat boy's disarming confidence,
strolled through an office of gleaming cherrywood paneling and
granite countertops. He wore faded jeans, a longsleeve
blue-striped shirt and black boots.
A month before trial, he sat behind his desk. He was relaxed and
smiling.
"I didn't take this case to make a political statement," Caddell
said. "Our goal is to win the lawsuit. If we win, that will be a
political statement."
However, he rejected the notion that the $675 million lawsuit is
about money.
"This has never been a case about money," Caddell said. "It's a
case about justice. Everyone will tell you that if you were in it
for the money, the last thing you would do is take this case.
That either makes me incredibly stupid, which I'm not, or
principled about why we took the case."
Not many attorneys wanted much to do with the Davidians' lawsuit,
said Houston attorney Dick DeGuerin, who represented David Koresh
during the 1993 siege.
"It was like the tar baby," DeGuerin said.
DeGuerin and Jack Zimmerman, the Houston attorney who represented
Koresh's top lieutenant, Steve Schneider, urged Caddell to take
the case after 76 bodies were pulled from the ashes of Mount
Carmel.
"He was up and coming," DeGuerin said. "His vigor impressed me.
Suing for damages is unpopular. You can't just be looking for
money. You've got to be willing to fight and to stay with it
despite setbacks."
Caddell said his impression of what happened at Mount Carmel
hasn't changed since he watched on TV as government tanks poked
holes in Mount Carmel, supposedly to create escape routes for
Davidians, then a deadly fire broke out.
"I said to myself, 'This didn't have to happen this way,'"
Caddell said. "I've done close to 200 depositions, looked at
hundreds of thousands of pages of documents, hired a ton of
experts and spent millions of dollars in time and money. I'm
still at the same place. People died who didn't have to die, and
the government has some responsibility for that."
A prominent Houston attorney said Caddell is a natural to try the
case.
"He's not a Republican power broker you can say is trying to
embarrass the president," said the attorney, who asked not to be
named. "Had he not filed this lawsuit, he may have been in line
for some sort of political appointment. His political donations
have been generous. The point is he's independent. He took this
case because he thought the government screwed up. And, frankly,
I can't think of many other lawyers who could afford to take on
the government."
His out-of-pocket expenses in the case are now more than $1
million, Caddell said. He laughs at the notion he's kept pace
with the government's spending, noting it brought nine attorneys
to Waco in April for a hearing on his request that the government
be sanctioned for allegedly tampering with evidence.
"This is not Microsoft versus the Justice Department," Caddell
said.
North Carolina attorney Kirk Lyons nonetheless credits Caddell
for "putting his pocket book where his principles are."
"I was there when the government dumped 100,000 documents on
them," Lyons said. "By now, I'm sure his firm has got everything
catalogued and stored where they can retrieve it. In my office,
there would be eight inches of dust on it. He's been able to keep
up with the government on what so far has been a pleadings war."
Lyons works for the Southern Legal Resource Center, a right-wing
civil liberties group criticized in the past for defending Klan
members. He also represents several Davidians, such as Misty
Ferguson, who was badly burned in the Mount Carmel fire. Caddell
will argue on behalf of Lyons' clients at the June 19 trial in
Waco.
"He may be uncomfortable with some of the things said about us,
but he's never been anything but professional," Lyons said. "He
makes the call but we're not left out of the consultation. It's a
smart thing to do. We all have to share responsibility for the
decisions made."
Lyons said he's had to defend Caddell to many of his friends, who
are uncomfortable with Caddell's slick image.
One is Davidian Clive Doyle. Doyle, earnest in a ready-made suit,
confronted Caddell, cool in a bomber jacket and shades, after the
Mount Carmel re-creation in March. Doyle accused Caddell of
selling out the Davidians by agreeing to the re-creation and by
stating the Davidians must share part of the blame for what
happened at Mount Carmel.
"I think his interests are with Clinton, the government," Doyle
said last week. "I hear all these things about how much he's
given Clinton and the Democratic Party. I feel he is
compromised.... I feel his interest is not in the survivors or
the families who lost loved ones. He is interested in serving his
own ends, more or less."
Lyons believes people misunderstand Caddell's approach to the
case.
"A lot of people disagree with Mike," Lyons said. "They say there
is no bottom line. We've got to find out what happened. But if
the government scoots out of this without paying a dime, they've
won. That's what Mike means. People can pick on my background,
too. Mike might be an unlikely choice to lead this team, but
thank God he is there."
Some of Caddell's critics - at least his southern-fried ones -
have more in common with him than they realize. Caddell, born in
Del Rio, Texas, grew up primarily in Alabama and Florida.
"When I get tired or have had too much to drink, like a lot of
people I slip into old habits," Caddell said. "That's when you
can hear my Alabama accent."
His Southern Baptist roots initially pulled him toward a career
in preaching.
"His mom (Joyce) said he was the smoothest talker she ever met,"
said his wife, Chapman, co-counsel on the Davidian case. "She
said he had a silver tongue and could pretty much talk them into
anything."
At the University of Virginia, however, Caddell decided his
calling was the law. And Houston was the altar where he wanted to
practice it.
"Beginning attorneys in New York and Los Angeles carried
briefcases for someone else," Caddell said.
Houston in 1979 was a mecca for trial attorneys. Leon Jaworski (a
Baylor Law School graduate) was only a few years removed from
being the Watergate prosecutor. Percy Foreman had retired but was
still around. Racehorse Haynes was dominating national headlines,
first with the John Hill murder trial, then the Cullen Davis
murder trial.
"Houston was and is a great place for trial lawyers," Caddell
said. "It's a place where trying cases is considered an art.
People have great respect for trial lawyers."
Caddell tried or settled 30 cases in his first five years in
Houston. His conviction was for civil law.
"I want to represent the good guys," Caddell said. "I can't
represent a client I don't believe in. I can't convince a judge
or jury of something I'm not convinced of."
He opened his own firm in 1985 and subsequently won a series of
high-profile, big-money cases.
In 1994, Caddell led a group of attorneys who won the largest
property damage class-action settlement in U.S. history. They
sued Shell Oil Co. and two other corporations for producing
polybutylene pipes that sprang leaks when exposed to tap water
chemicals such as chlorine. The settlement was for $1
billion.Last year, a month after Judge Walter S. Smith Jr. of
Waco refused to grant the government a summary judgment and set a
trial date for the Branch Davidian's wrongful-death lawsuit,
Caddell's firm won a $30 million settlement against a New York
apparel maker. A van driven by a company employee crashed in
Mexico and killed 14 employees.
"I don't make any apologies at being good at what I do," Caddell
said. "We work extremely hard here. We're honest. Ethical. Smart.
We take on cases we believe in. By and large, we're successful."
For the last few months, Caddell estimates he's averaged working
12 hours a day. Every day.
"Yesterday, I got on a flight from Houston at 7 a.m.," Caddell
said. "I got back to Houston at midnight."
Chapman stuck her head in the door to tell Caddell a mutual
friend was leaving a Houston law office to start his own firm.
Caddell suggested his wife call and invite him to lunch.
"How about Thursday?" Caddell asked.
"I'm in San Antonio," Chapman said. "How about Friday?"
"I'm in Mexico," Caddell said.
They finally picked a day the following week.
"That's the only day we'll be in town," Chapman said, leaving.
That's part of the reason he and his family live in a hotel,
Caddell said.
"We're probably out of town 50 percent of the time," he said.
"This way, it's easy to come and go. I like living downtown. It's
a short commute to work. Cynthia and I love to go to the opera,
the ballet, the theater, the symphony. Plus, it's great for our
little boy (John Chapman). He comes and visits us every
afternoon. I've walked over to the new stadium with him on my
shoulders a couple of times. That was great fun."
Photographs of his son, 2, take top billing over photos of people
like former governor Ann Richards in Caddell's office. Like many
people, Caddell finds the kids at Mount Carmel the most
sympathetic victims in the wrongful-death lawsuit.
"You can't call a 2-year-old a Davidian," Caddell said. "No
2-year-old carried a weapon on Feb. 28. No 2-year-old converted a
semi-automatic to a fully automatic weapon. And no 2-year-old
helped start a fire on April 19. I don't see how the government
can say it's not partly responsible for the death of those
children."
He talked while skimming legal documents, scribbling notes on
Post-its and giving directions to his staff.
"It helps to be able to dual-process," he said.
Chapman said her husband is unflappable.
"I'm not saying he's the best briefer or the best researcher, but
there's no one like him in the courtroom," she said. "No one is
as good on their feet. He loves that. He loves being tossed
things that he's not expecting. I've never seen anyone as
accurately impeach a witness - in a nice way, of course."
His love of challenges has been tested. Judge Smith recently
denied Caddell's request for sanctions against the government,
and a company retained by the court stated it believes the
flashes in the infrared tape taken at Mount Carmel are not
gunfire. Plaintiffs argue that government gunfire kept many
Davidians from fleeing their burning building.
Caddell shrugged off the turn of events.
"I like where we are," Caddell said. "The two issues I felt most
strongly about that day I watched the fire, the failure to have
firefighting equipment available and knocking the building down,
we have better evidence on than I could have hoped for. We have a
smoking-gun document where (Jeffrey) Jamar and (Dick) Rogers said
there would be no plan to fight a fire. That's inconceivable.
We've also got the medal commendations (for tank drivers)
submitted by Jamar and Rogers. It says in mid-morning the tank
drivers were instructed to begin the systematic demolition of the
building."
Caddell paused to smile.
"That's about as good as it gets," he said.
=================================================================
Kadosh, Kadosh, Kadosh, YHVH, TZEVAOT
FROM THE DESK OF: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
*Mike Spitzer* <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
~~~~~~~~ <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
The Best Way To Destroy Enemies Is To Change Them To Friends
Shalom, A Salaam Aleikum, and to all, A Good Day.
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