4: Paragraph 38 I'd been taught in law school that a civil lawyer's
main function is to avoid litigation, to get cases to settle without
going to trial. So I wrote some letters to Hutton asking them to settle
my legal claims against them without making me file suit. In a letter
dated 22 September 1986, Hutton's new legal vp Stephen J. Friedman
called my "demands" extortion and said they were looking into having me
disbarred in every jurisdiction where I was admitted to practice law.
4: Paragraph 39 I tried for months to hire a lawyer to represent me,
but no one would, and then one of my mentors told me the word was out,
and I wouldn't be able to find any lawyer who would sue Hutton for me.
So on 31 August 1987 I filed a civil RICO suit against Hutton Group,
Hutton & Co., and Hutton Trust in federal court in Wilmington, and I
filed it 'pro se', which means for myself, without any attorney
representing me.
4: Paragraph 40 I hadn't known much about RICO before 1987, but I'd
done enough research to know that was the legal theory I wanted to use:
Because I lived in Delaware and all three Hutton entities were Delaware
corporations, there wasn't diversity of citizenship, so I couldn't go to
federal court unless I raised a federal question, and the RICO statute
was federal, so it provided jurisdiction.
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