Panici had gotten one judge removed in his divorce, and APR had tried to remove Atkinson. Coincidence or strategy?
I stood outside the judicial coordinator’s office thinking about Cai’s revelation that APR had been attempting to have Atkinson removed from the case. Cai’s understanding of their argument was that Atkinson was biased. Apparently, a prior case where Atkinson had ruled against the attorney had been used as evidence. A negative ruling was hardly adequate grounds to toss a case to someone else, and the argument had been dismissed promptly by the chief judge.
The question now, as I considered the situation, was had they tried to remove Atkinson because the attorney was an idiot, or was this part of a bigger strategy that I didn’t yet understand? It was quite clear that this attorney wasn’t exactly Harvard Law material, but that could be because the plaintiff was cheap or it could be by design. Inept attorneys who didn’t know the game, who chomped at the bit to get cases that ranked higher in prestige, deluding themselves into thinking this was their big shot. Then drowning in work well beyond their pay grade, they were used as pawns so their fumbling could serve as delay. Or, his dumb mistakes could be used as part of an appeal if the process didn’t go your way. Although, it would take a client that didn’t mind risk to take that chance, because the strategy could easily backfire.
In this case, the choice of wet-behind-the-ears attorney in over his head felt like a delay tactic, as did the effort to switch judges.
As I walked into the coordinator’s office, Tiana Williams looked up from her computer screen and waved at me across the room, motioning me in. This was my third trip into her office, and I had already become a familiar face.
“Anything new?” she said when I reached her desk.
“There is some progress, but nothing that I can talk to you about yet. I promise I’m doing everything I can to find out who killed Judge Reynolds and why.”
“I know you are. I could see the intensity in your eyes the moment we met. I just wish it would be faster. It feels like every day we don’t have an answer, we get further away from finding out the truth. I know it hasn’t been that long, really, but each day seems like a week. I just have to keep telling myself investigations take time and the right people are working on it. Did you have a question for me?” She looked at me expectantly, anxious to help if she could.
“Actually, I was wondering if I could speak to Justine, the woman you introduced me to, the one from Judge Atkinson’s office.”
“I think she’s in the file room right now, so hang tight for just a minute.”
Tiana stood to go retrieve Justine when the woman exited a back hallway. She smiled brightly when she saw me and walked over.
“Do you have some news?” she asked with the same hopeful tone Tiana had used.
“As I just told Tiana, there are some developments, but nothing appropriate to talk about yet. But I have some questions for you, if you wouldn’t mind.”
“If there’s anything I can do to help figure out who killed Judge Atkinson, I’m happy to do it. What would you like to know?” She swung the stack of file folders she had in her arms to the desktop and pulled over an additional chair.
Justine and I sat on the side of Tiana’s desk where framed photos of two young children carried the label World’s Best Grandma.
“I understand there was an open case before Judge Atkinson involving a company called APR Holdings,” I began. “The attorney representing APR was named Stephan Bruni, and the defendant was a Nathan Vogel. Do you recall the case? It involved a right-of-way dispute involving access to Mr. Vogel’s home.”
“Yes, I remember the case, largely because there was so much rescheduling. Nothing bothered Judge Atkinson more than when lawyers kept going rounds over petty legal points. Especially when he thought it was nothing more than a delay tactic.”
“Did he say something to you about this attorney intentionally delaying the case?” I asked, wondering how obvious the ploy had been.
“He did. As I told you the other day, he had no patience for that kind of thing. Attorneys who came in all puffed up with bravado really irked him. The plaintiff’s attorney, Bruni, he repeatedly had all kinds of mistakes in his filings. Things that he would correct and resubmit after Judge Atkinson told him to get his act together. He’d fix the problem, then a week later there would be another request to push the deadline back or reschedule the conference hearing. His motions for continuance just didn’t end. Atkinson thought the guy was either trying to rack up billing hours or he was intentionally delaying. And it was particularly annoying to him because he thought their legal argument was weak. I probably shouldn’t say that, but the man is dead now, so I guess it doesn’t hurt.”
“Had this attorney been in Judge Atkinson’s court prior to this case?”
“I’d have to look that up,” she said. “But it sounds familiar.”
Tiana scooted out of the way, letting Justine have access to her computer.
“Here it is. That was about three years ago, and the case was also a real estate issue.” She scanned the screen before continuing. “The ruling did not go in attorney Bruni’s favor. Well, his client’s favor would be more accurate. Judge Atkinson wasn’t a patient man, and the judgment was pretty harsh. He stopped short of calling Bruni incompetent, as that would have given him cause to appeal, but that’s what he said without saying it, if you know what I mean.”
I knew exactly what she meant. There was little worse for an attorney than a scathing ruling in which the judge felt the need to wax poetic on the ridiculousness of your argument. It had never happened to me, but I’d had the pleasure of reading a few that blasted my opponents.
“And you said that case was a real estate situation. By any chance, was the plaintiff in that case also APR holdings?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact, it was. And now that I think about it, it was that prior ruling they used to try to have Judge Atkinson removed from this recent case, arguing that he was biased against them, given the nature of his response. It was all ridiculous, of course. Some attorneys will try anything, no matter how outrageous, if they think it helps them win.”
From my own legal history, I knew the process for having a judge reassigned involved bumping the case up to the next level. The chief judge would review and make a determination. Occasionally, if a judge thought his involvement in the case muddied the waters to such a degree that both sides wondered if anyone could be fair, the judge would step aside voluntarily. But typically that would involve a highly contentious, emotion-filled lawsuit. This wasn’t in the scheme of things, so I wasn’t surprised that the chief judge had denied the request. However, if Bruni wanted to make this an issue, it sounded like he was willing to scream loud enough to get some attention.
My question regarding APR’s strategy was still not being answered. Yes, delay was part of the intended result, but was there something more? I was having a hard time imagining a company savvy enough to develop real estate not being savvy enough to hire an attorney that would help them win. Unless delay was the win. Or when they realized delay wasn’t having the effect they wanted, that’s when they moved to trying for a different judge. Perhaps a more sympathetic judge.
“Do you remember when the request to replace Judge Atkinson was made?”
“Let me think. I believe the original filing was last March, and the request to change judges happened at some point in June. It was denied almost immediately. But the plaintiff came at it again, I’d say, a month later. So, late July, early August.”
My mind ran through the timeline.
“Could I get the case number on the original case?”
Justine went back to Tiana’s computer again and tapped at the keys. She scribbled the number on a Post-it and handed it to me.
“If the request for a new judge had been approved, who would’ve been assigned to the case?”
“My guess is it would have been Judge Grishin. He has a lot of history with real estate cases. I think he was a real estate attorney prior to becoming a judge.”
I tucked the note in my bag, thanked the ladies, and told them I would call them with any big news as soon as I was able. After leaving the court building, I crossed the street and headed into City Hall, straight for the zoning department.
“Hi,” I said to the gal at the desk. She looked up from her paperwork and gave me a blank stare, waiting for the ask, I assumed. “I have a question about a property in my neighborhood. It used to be a gas station. It’s been vacant for at least five years, and I see that the new owner seems to be preparing for some kind of construction. I’m really worried about the chemicals. You know they store those tanks underground, so if they start tearing up that blacktop, I’m worried that there might still be gas in the tank or that gas might have leached into the dirt. If I give you the parcel number, is it possible for you to look up whether permits have been properly pulled?”
“I can search by the address,” she said. “Actually, anyone can. The city of Chicago maintains a database of all building permits issued in the city. You need the address or the permit number. And then you enter a date range. Just give me a second and I can pull that up for you.”
I scribbled the address on the scratch paper on the desk and slid it her way. A moment later, she looked up.
“Well, I don’t see any permits in the system for that address. I broadened the search to the last five years, and there’s nothing here. It sounds like you’re right to be concerned, however. There are very strict guidelines regarding removal and abatement of gas and oil. Like asbestos, it requires specialized contractors for the cleanup before anything new can be built.”
“And who would I contact if I start seeing someone working?”
“You can call 311 and file a report, or you can do it online on the city website.”
“Can you check one more address for me while you have that screen open?” I jotted down the address of the empty lot currently being graded.
“I do find a permit on that address. The permit was issued in July to raze a garage on the lot.”
“And does your system indicate who requested the permit?”
“The permit was issued to Rae Panici.”