5: Paragraph 32 So I asked Shapiro if he'd reviewed any documents in
preparation for testifying, and Bingo! He admitted to reviewing the
commissioner's 1986 report, I asked for it, and Longobardi said they had
to let me see it; Foster objected and kept dithering about it being too
late for me to make a request for Hutton to produce documents, but that
just showed she didn't understand the rules of evidence. Moments like
that made the trial truly memorable.
5: Paragraph 33 Neither Hutton nor I had asked to have a jury for
the trial: I didn't, because I thought the breaches of fiduciary duty,
both the trustee's duties and the directors' duties, were too technical
for many jurors to care about, and I wasn't sure a jury would see me as
a sympathetic plaintiff; you'd have to ask Hutton why they didn't want a
jury. Besides, a jury comes back with a verdict, and you're pretty much
stuck with it, but when you have the judge decide the case, he has to
issue an opinion setting forth his reasons, and if you appeal his
ruling, the appellate court goes over his reasoning as well as his
result. And whatever his shortcomings of intellect and temperament,
Longobardi used to be a vice chancellor and so must have a solid
background in both types of fiduciary breach.
5: Paragraph 34 At the end of the evidence on 1 October, he gave us
an expedited schedule for filing our written arguments because, he said,
he wanted us all "to deal with this while it's hot and fresh in our
minds.
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