http://www-catalog.cpl.org/CLENIX/ACO-8557 The King of torts (Cincinnati attorney, known as "Master of Disaster", has won more than $1 billion for thousands of victims) ----------------------------- http://pview.findlaw.com/view/2578829_1?channel=LP Stanley M. Chesley Firm: Waite, Schneider, Bayless & Chesley Address: 1513 Fourth & Vine Tower Cincinnati, OH 45202 Phone: (513) 621-0267 Fax: (513) 381-2375 E-mail: Contact Us Web site: http://www.wsbc-col.com http://www.wsbclaw.com (Cincinnati Office) Accepts Credit Cards Position Areas of Practice Bar Admissions Lawyer Profile: Waite, Schneider, Bayless & Chesley has been among the leaders in the practice of complex multi party and individual litigation for nearly thirty years. The path into these highly specialized areas of law was cleared by the firm's Senior Attorney, Stanley M. Chesley. Mr. Chesley has been touted as one of the Nation's best and most successful lawyers by fellow litigators, judges, professional organizations and legal publications since he first emerged on the national mass litigation scene in 1977 when the crowded Beverly Hills Supper Club in Southgate, Kentucky burst into flames, killing 165 people and injuring another 116. The organizational strategy used by Stan Chesley and practiced by the core of attorneys developed at Waite, Schneider, Bayless & Chesley has helped deliver high demand, leading edge legal services to clients involved in individual personal injury actions, mass transportation disasters, multi party complex personal injury and wrongful death litigation and complex corporate and anti-trust legal actions nationwide for the last twenty-five years. Mr. Chesley's involvement in large individual law suits and complex multi party litigation has not gone unnoticed by the legal profession or by the business community and media. A review of but a few of the media and legal publications commenting on Stan Chesley's career, demonstrates the impact that his expertise has had on the legal profession: "Stanley Chesley is clearly in a class apart in Mega Torts." "In his pursuit of credibility and respect, Stanley Chesley has helped turn the Plaintiffs Bar from a rag tag army of ambulance chasers into a force that strikes fear into the hearts of even the biggest, most powerful corporate defendants in the Country." (Forbes, February 22, 1988, Master of Disaster, page 48) "The facts are simple: in the last ten years, Chesley has negotiated settlements in most of the blockbuster torts litigation that's come along: Agent Orange, Bendectin, Bhopal, Bjork-Shiley Heart Valve, and Breast Implants. He has achieved legal breakthroughs including the first major victory involving the U.S. Department of Energy in an Ohio Radiation Contamination case - and jaw dropping fee awards like the $17 million his firm and three others earned in the same case. He has represented thousands of victims of hotel fires, airplane crashes, plant explosions and toxic spills, and he estimates that in his career he has racked up more than $3 billion for his clients (not counting the Breast Implant women, whose settlement has not yet been approved). 'I like to think of myself as a great equalizer', Chesley says." "Last summer, the City of Cincinnati didn't have enough money to pay life guards, so it planned to close public pools in several disadvantaged neighborhoods. Chesley ... was appalled. The day that he heard about the problem, he donated $5,000.00 himself and raised another $75,000.00 in pledges from business acquaintances. Not only did the pools open, but Chesley helped put together a plan for local businesses to sponsor pools next summer. The resolution, which netted Chesley a front page headline in the Cincinnati Post was the quintessence of what Chesley would like his deals to be: it righted a wrong, quickly and creatively. 'He's a doer', says William Keating, Jr., a former State Court Judge and Congressman who sat on the Board of Trustees of the University of Cincinnati while Chesley was Chairman. 'He has a way of bringing things to finality.' " "Chesley, as other Cincinnatians are quick to note, has become a City legend without much help from anyone else." (The American Lawyer, January/February, 1994, Et Tu, Stan?, page 68) "Chesley first leaped into national attention sixteen years ago by performing a litigators miracle - he squeezed the legal equivalent of blood from a stone. The case was the Beverly Hills Supper Club Fire in which 165 died in Suburban Northern Kentucky, just across the river from Cincinnati. The out- of-court settlement of $49 million for victims and their families was about $47 million more than most observers thought possible since the Club carried so little insurance. Chesley worked this financial wonder by lumping all of the Plaintiffs together in one class action suit - a highly unusual tactic in personal injury cases at the time - and by going after every manufacturer and contractor who could possibly be held liable, not only for the fire that destroyed the night club, but for the toxic smoke that killed the victims as they tried to escape." "Beginning with the Beverly Hills Supper Club case sixteen years ago, Chesley wrote the book on Mass Torts and Class Action Law suits, and, by example, he helped transform the Plaintiffs Bar from a rag-tag band to a more polished, better organized, better financed group of professionals that strikes fear in the hearts of the Fortune 500." (Ohio Magazine, April, 1993, The King of Torts, page 33) Mr. Chesley has also been featured by prominent legal publications such as the ABA Journal, Ohio Law, The National Law Journal and the Best Lawyers in America. He has been named as a leading lawyer who practices power law, among the 100 most influential lawyers in the nation and among the best lawyers in the State of Ohio. Current Employment Position(s): Member Senior Attorney Areas of Practice: Commercial Air Crash Disasters Complex Commercial and Anti-Trust Litigation Fires and Explosions in public venues Medical Products Nuclear and Chemical Environmental Contamination Litigation Bar Admissions: Ohio, 1960 Kentucky, 1978 U.S. Federal Court, 1960 U.S. Supreme Court, 1970 West Practice Categories: Administrative Law, Antitrust Law, Business & Commercial Law, Energy Law, Environmental Law, Insurance Law, Litigation & Appeals, Personal Injury -- Defense, Aviation Accidents -- Defense, Personal Injury -- Plaintiff, Products Liability Law, Medical Products & Devices, Science & Technology Law, Transportation Law ------------------------------------------- http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2007701210391 Kentucky's Fen-Phen case: A breach of duty; wealth mounts for 'prince of torts' By Andrew Wolfson • awolfson@courier-journal.com • January 21, 2007 * Post a Comment * Recommend * Print this page * E-mail this article * Share o Del.icio.us o Facebook o Digg o Reddit o Newsvine o Buzz up! * What’s this? CINCINNATI — Dubbed the "master of disaster" and "prince of torts," he has represented tens of thousands of victims of airplane crashes, defective products, hotel fires and toxic spills. By his own count, he has racked up more than $7 billion for his clients. Forbes magazine once credited him with helping turn the plaintiffs bar "from a rag tag army of ambulance chasers into a force that strikes fear into the hearts of even the biggest, most powerful corporate defendants." But Stan Chesley, one of the world's leading and most knowledgeable class-action lawyers, says he had no idea that his co-counsels in the $200 million Kentucky fen-phen settlement five years ago were deceiving their clients. Chesley, of Cincinnati, collected a $20.5 million fee to negotiate the settlement and claims he had no legal duty to the 440 plaintiffs, because he was hired by their lawyers. "I was not a lawyer for those people," he said in an interview earlier this year. The plaintiffs eventually received only one- third of the settlement. Chesley, 70, declined to respond to a reporter's questions about the case, or his career. Whether he will be sanctioned is one of the intriguing unanswered questions in Kentucky's simmering legal scandal over the settlement. A judge already has found that Lexington lawyers Shirley Cunningham Jr., William Gallion and Melbourne Mills Jr., breached their fiduciary duties in part by taking fees that exceeded their contracts. But Special Judge William Wehr, who is presiding over a lawsuit filed against the lawyers by more than 400 of their former clients, has reserved judgment on Chesley's role. Angela Ford, a Lexington lawyer who represents the former plaintiffs, has alleged in court that Chesley knew of the "shockingly fraudulent conduct" of his fellow lawyers and was "up to his eyeballs" in their scheme. Ford argues that while Chesley had no direct contact with clients, simple arithmetic would have shown him that his fellow lawyers had taken excessive fees: Chesley's contract called for him to get 21 percent of the lawyers' gross fees, so his own take would have shown that the other lawyers took about $100 million, or half the settlement. (2 of 4) In interviews, three of the nation's leading authorities on legal ethics rejected Chesley's contention that he had no fiduciary duty to the plaintiffs. "He was unquestionably co-counsel for the clients, and had all lawyer-client fiduciary duties to them," said Hofstra University law professor Monroe Freedman, whose opinion was shared by professors Geoffrey Hazard Jr. of University of Pennsylvania and Stephen Gillers of New York University. Chesley's lawyer, Frank Benton IV, has said that if Chesley was overpaid, he will reimburse the three Lexington lawyers so they can pay back their clients. But if Chesley is found by Wehr to have breached his duties, he could be liable for punitive damages and forced to surrender even more of his fee. Chesley has contended in court papers that he had no communications with clients, that he didn't sign the settlement, and that he had no role in a charitable foundation into which the three Lexington lawyers diverted more than $20 million from the settlement funds. But Ford says in court papers that Chesley's own contract listed him as "co-counsel" for the plaintiffs. And Mills has said in a deposition that Chesley represented the clients. Ford also said that Chesley received court orders showing that settlement money was being poured into the foundation. "Chesley was either an active participant or stood by and did nothing," Ford said. A rich life Chesley is the son of Ukrainian immigrants and he once sold shoes at a local department store. He now enjoys fabulous wealth. He lives in what The Cincinnati Enquirer has described as the most expensive home ever sold in greater Cincinnati, a 25-room, 27,000-square-foot French chateau that he bought in 2004 for $8 million. The sprawling slate-roof mansion on five acres is attached to an eight-car garage and a carriage house and surrounded by 300 acres of forest and fields. (3 of 4) He and his wife, Susan Dlott, a federal judge, live there with two Cavalier King Charles Spaniels whom Dlott has sworn in as honorary federal marshals and regularly takes to her chambers, The Cincinnati Enquirer has written. Chesley's more than 20 cars include Jaguars, Rolls- Royces, Ferraris, Aston Martins and Bentleys, the Cincinnati Business Courier reported two years ago. He has raised millions of dollars for the Democratic Party and for former President Bill Clinton, who three times came to his home for fundraisers; Clinton appointed Dlott to the federal district bench in 1995, according to media accounts. Recounting his own career, Chesley has said that he worked for 17 years as an obscure products-liability lawyer until May 28, 1977, when the Beverly Hills Supper Club burned to the ground in Southgate, Ky., killing 165 people. The nightclub's owner had only $1 million in insurance, but Chesley devised the novel strategy of suing the entire aluminum electrical wire industry, whose product was found to have caused the blaze, as well as more than a dozen other companies. He eventually won $49 million in verdicts and settlements. He later went on to negotiate settlements in blockbuster cases involving Agent Orange and Bendectin, among other products. He became one of the feared and famous members of the plaintiffs bar, earning his living off disasters that included the 1980 MGM Grand hotel fire in Las Vegas, the 1985 Arrow Air crash that killed 248 Kentucky-based soldiers, and the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. He also helped win $5 billion from Dow Corning, the manufacturer of silicone breast implants, and was one of a group of lawyers who brokered the $246 billion national tobacco settlement in 1996. Journalist Peter Pringle wrote in a 1998 book on that case, "Cornered: Big Tobacco at the Bar of Justice," that Chesley was "one of the least liked leading members of the plaintiffs inner circle, mainly because of his seemingly uncontrolled vanity and relentless name dropping." (4 of 4) Mississippi lawyer Dick Scruggs, who represented state attorneys general in the tobacco settlement, told The Courier-Journal last month : "I didn't know him five minutes and I wanted to hit him." Chesley was an "effective advocate" and had a "keen knowledge of all the political players," including Clinton, Scruggs said. "But Stan will take every advantage you will allow him to take. Some will say his style is a bit ruthless." However, Cincinnati plaintiffs lawyer Jim Helmer, a competitor who has sometimes clashed with Chesley, credits him for taking high-risk cases that most lawyers couldn't understand, let alone win. "There is a lot of jealousy in the plaintiffs bar for anyone who is successful," Helmer said, "and no lawyer in America may have collected more money for injured plaintiffs than him." That includes $85 million that he and a team of lawyers won in January for parishioners sexually abused by priests in the Diocese of Covington. The group, led by Chesley, stands to collect a $25.5 million fee. Chesley won acclaim in that litigation by getting a court to certify the first class action in a priest-abuse case in the United States. But the case has attracted scrutiny because it involved the same judge, Joseph Bamberger, and the same trial consultant, Mark Modlin, who served in the fen-phen case. Bamberger was publicly reprimanded and forced to resign in February by the Judicial Conduct Commission, in part for failing to recuse himself from the fen-phen case in light of his close friendship with Modlin, for whom he approved a $2.04 million fee. A breach of duty; wealth mounts for 'prince of torts' By Andrew Wolfson • awolfson@courier-journal.com • January 21, 2007 * Post a Comment * Recommend * Print this page * E-mail this article * Share o Del.icio.us o Facebook o Digg o Reddit o Newsvine o Buzz up! * What’s this? CINCINNATI — Dubbed the "master of disaster" and "prince of torts," he has represented tens of thousands of victims of airplane crashes, defective products, hotel fires and toxic spills. By his own count, he has racked up more than $7 billion for his clients. Forbes magazine once credited him with helping turn the plaintiffs bar "from a rag tag army of ambulance chasers into a force that strikes fear into the hearts of even the biggest, most powerful corporate defendants." But Stan Chesley, one of the world's leading and most knowledgeable class-action lawyers, says he had no idea that his co-counsels in the $200 million Kentucky fen-phen settlement five years ago were deceiving their clients. Chesley, of Cincinnati, collected a $20.5 million fee to negotiate the settlement and claims he had no legal duty to the 440 plaintiffs, because he was hired by their lawyers. "I was not a lawyer for those people," he said in an interview earlier this year. The plaintiffs eventually received only one- third of the settlement. Chesley, 70, declined to respond to a reporter's questions about the case, or his career. Whether he will be sanctioned is one of the intriguing unanswered questions in Kentucky's simmering legal scandal over the settlement. A judge already has found that Lexington lawyers Shirley Cunningham Jr., William Gallion and Melbourne Mills Jr., breached their fiduciary duties in part by taking fees that exceeded their contracts. But Special Judge William Wehr, who is presiding over a lawsuit filed against the lawyers by more than 400 of their former clients, has reserved judgment on Chesley's role. Angela Ford, a Lexington lawyer who represents the former plaintiffs, has alleged in court that Chesley knew of the "shockingly fraudulent conduct" of his fellow lawyers and was "up to his eyeballs" in their scheme. Ford argues that while Chesley had no direct contact with clients, simple arithmetic would have shown him that his fellow lawyers had taken excessive fees: Chesley's contract called for him to get 21 percent of the lawyers' gross fees, so his own take would have shown that the other lawyers took about $100 million, or half the settlement. (2 of 4) In interviews, three of the nation's leading authorities on legal ethics rejected Chesley's contention that he had no fiduciary duty to the plaintiffs. "He was unquestionably co-counsel for the clients, and had all lawyer-client fiduciary duties to them," said Hofstra University law professor Monroe Freedman, whose opinion was shared by professors Geoffrey Hazard Jr. of University of Pennsylvania and Stephen Gillers of New York University. Chesley's lawyer, Frank Benton IV, has said that if Chesley was overpaid, he will reimburse the three Lexington lawyers so they can pay back their clients. But if Chesley is found by Wehr to have breached his duties, he could be liable for punitive damages and forced to surrender even more of his fee. Chesley has contended in court papers that he had no communications with clients, that he didn't sign the settlement, and that he had no role in a charitable foundation into which the three Lexington lawyers diverted more than $20 million from the settlement funds. But Ford says in court papers that Chesley's own contract listed him as "co-counsel" for the plaintiffs. And Mills has said in a deposition that Chesley represented the clients. Ford also said that Chesley received court orders showing that settlement money was being poured into the foundation. "Chesley was either an active participant or stood by and did nothing," Ford said. A rich life Chesley is the son of Ukrainian immigrants and he once sold shoes at a local department store. He now enjoys fabulous wealth. He lives in what The Cincinnati Enquirer has described as the most expensive home ever sold in greater Cincinnati, a 25-room, 27,000-square-foot French chateau that he bought in 2004 for $8 million. The sprawling slate-roof mansion on five acres is attached to an eight-car garage and a carriage house and surrounded by 300 acres of forest and fields. He and his wife, Susan Dlott, a federal judge, live there with two Cavalier King Charles Spaniels whom Dlott has sworn in as honorary federal marshals and regularly takes to her chambers, The Cincinnati Enquirer has written. Chesley's more than 20 cars include Jaguars, Rolls- Royces, Ferraris, Aston Martins and Bentleys, the Cincinnati Business Courier reported two years ago. He has raised millions of dollars for the Democratic Party and for former President Bill Clinton, who three times came to his home for fundraisers; Clinton appointed Dlott to the federal district bench in 1995, according to media accounts. Recounting his own career, Chesley has said that he worked for 17 years as an obscure products-liability lawyer until May 28, 1977, when the Beverly Hills Supper Club burned to the ground in Southgate, Ky., killing 165 people. The nightclub's owner had only $1 million in insurance, but Chesley devised the novel strategy of suing the entire aluminum electrical wire industry, whose product was found to have caused the blaze, as well as more than a dozen other companies. He eventually won $49 million in verdicts and settlements. He later went on to negotiate settlements in blockbuster cases involving Agent Orange and Bendectin, among other products. He became one of the feared and famous members of the plaintiffs bar, earning his living off disasters that included the 1980 MGM Grand hotel fire in Las Vegas, the 1985 Arrow Air crash that killed 248 Kentucky-based soldiers, and the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. He also helped win $5 billion from Dow Corning, the manufacturer of silicone breast implants, and was one of a group of lawyers who brokered the $246 billion national tobacco settlement in 1996. Journalist Peter Pringle wrote in a 1998 book on that case, "Cornered: Big Tobacco at the Bar of Justice," that Chesley was "one of the least liked leading members of the plaintiffs inner circle, mainly because of his seemingly uncontrolled vanity and relentless name dropping." (4 of 4) Mississippi lawyer Dick Scruggs, who represented state attorneys general in the tobacco settlement, told The Courier-Journal last month : "I didn't know him five minutes and I wanted to hit him." Chesley was an "effective advocate" and had a "keen knowledge of all the political players," including Clinton, Scruggs said. "But Stan will take every advantage you will allow him to take. Some will say his style is a bit ruthless." However, Cincinnati plaintiffs lawyer Jim Helmer, a competitor who has sometimes clashed with Chesley, credits him for taking high-risk cases that most lawyers couldn't understand, let alone win. "There is a lot of jealousy in the plaintiffs bar for anyone who is successful," Helmer said, "and no lawyer in America may have collected more money for injured plaintiffs than him." That includes $85 million that he and a team of lawyers won in January for parishioners sexually abused by priests in the Diocese of Covington. The group, led by Chesley, stands to collect a $25.5 million fee. Chesley won acclaim in that litigation by getting a court to certify the first class action in a priest-abuse case in the United States. But the case has attracted scrutiny because it involved the same judge, Joseph Bamberger, and the same trial consultant, Mark Modlin, who served in the fen-phen case. Bamberger was publicly reprimanded and forced to resign in February by the Judicial Conduct Commission, in part for failing to recuse himself from the fen-phen case in light of his close friendship with Modlin, for whom he approved a $2.04 million fee. Mississippi lawyer Dick Scruggs, who represented state attorneys general in the tobacco settlement, told The Courier-Journal last month : "I didn't know him five minutes and I wanted to hit him." Chesley was an "effective advocate" and had a "keen knowledge of all the political players," including Clinton, Scruggs said. "But Stan will take every advantage you will allow him to take. Some will say his style is a bit ruthless." However, Cincinnati plaintiffs lawyer Jim Helmer, a competitor who has sometimes clashed with Chesley, credits him for taking high-risk cases that most lawyers couldn't understand, let alone win. "There is a lot of jealousy in the plaintiffs bar for anyone who is successful," Helmer said, "and no lawyer in America may have collected more money for injured plaintiffs than him." That includes $85 million that he and a team of lawyers won in January for parishioners sexually abused by priests in the Diocese of Covington. The group, led by Chesley, stands to collect a $25.5 million fee. Chesley won acclaim in that litigation by getting a court to certify the first class action in a priest-abuse case in the United States. But the case has attracted scrutiny because it involved the same judge, Joseph Bamberger, and the same trial consultant, Mark Modlin, who served in the fen-phen case. Bamberger was publicly reprimanded and forced to resign in February by the Judicial Conduct Commission, in part for failing to recuse himself from the fen-phen case in light of his close friendship with Modlin, for whom he approved a $2.04 million fee. Reporter Andrew Wolfson can be reached at (502) 582-7189.