The client who needed me most.

Each time you take a personal injury case, you make a commitment to help a person in need. But sometimes the injury is particularly grievous or the client is especially vulnerable. Here, five lawyers remember clients who needed special attention.

ILLUSTRATIONS BY GREGORY MEMEC

Hard changes for a good cop

Roxanne Barton Conlin

All our clients need us in large ways and small. They need us to get them compensation so they can go on with their lives. They need funds for medical care or vocational rehabilitation. They need more education.

When someone has died, the family needs funeral expenses and ongoing support. They often need a sympathetic ear or someone to hold their hands or listen to their stories. They might need advice on whether to sell the house or trade the car or buy a new TV. Who is the best doctor for their injuries? Who is a good mental health counselor? Do they need a will? Every trial lawyer knows the myriad roles we play in our clients' lives.

When I met Rick Gail, he didn't look like he needed any help from anybody. He was a giant of a man, handsome in his police blues. He was 26 years old, married to Janet, with two children.

He was everything we want our police officers to be. From the time he was old enough to race his bicycle through the neighborhood following the sound of a siren, Rick never wanted to be anything else. The day he took his officer's oath was one of the proudest of his life. He was absolutely devoted to his work on the Cedar Rapids, Iowa, police force. In a few short years he won numerous commendations and honors, including the medal of valor for his courage in the face of a robber's gunfire.

On September 12, 1981, at about 10 p.m., 19-year-old Ronald Clark walked into a convenience store. Witnesses said he was staggering, speaking loudly, and slurring his words. He wanted a 12-pack of Pabst Blue Ribbon beer. The man at the counter sold it to him.

Clark and three friends were up for an evening of "cruising the avenue"--driving up and down First Avenue in Cedar Rapids--in Clark's souped-up Dodge pickup. At 3:30 a.m., two officers in a patrol car saw the pickup and another vehicle drag racing and ordered them to stop. Clark sped off, leading the police on a high-speed chase through residential neighborhoods.

Rick Gail was on duty that night. He heard about the chase on his squad car radio and turned on his emergency lights. As he was pulling into an intersection, Clark's pickup truck came roaring out of the darkness at 100 miles per hour, flew past a stop sign, and crashed into the driver's side of Rick's squad car.

Rick was declared dead at the scene, but somehow he started to breathe again. He suffered a concussion. Every rib was broken, and many of the pieces punctured his lungs. His doctors thought they lost him two more times during his five-week hospitalization. His fellow officers kept watch around the clock.

Rick's will to live was strong and he eventually was released from the hospital, but when he went home, he battled depression. A deeply religious man whose father was a minister, Rick believed that God was angry at him. The goal that sustained him was returning to the police force--a goal he achieved nine months after the crash. He remained as devoted to the force as ever.

My law firm sued the convenience store that sold Ronald Clark several 12-packs of cold beer the night of the crash, which he drank throughout the evening. After taking over the case from another attorney, I first met Rick a few months before trial.

I launched into full-blown case preparation. First, I visited all Rick's doctors. Each expressed amazement at his recovery. I then contacted his partner, former partners, and others on his shift at the police department. They were reluctant to talk to me. Many made appointments and canceled, or just failed to show up. This happened again and again.

Finally, I went to the police station, found Rick's partner, and told him that no one from the department would see me. I asked why. He refused to answer but finally agreed to meet with me.

After much probing, I learned that, in fact, Rick had not recovered fully from his injuries. His partner told me that after one foot chase, Rick collapsed and passed out. He could not run and often had trouble breathing. He simply could not do his job. No one on the force wanted to say so, but they knew it.

Rick's fellow officers had the utmost affection and respect for him, but they worried about him and each other. His partner said simply, "Something bad is going to happen." Everyone knew what police work meant to Rick, and no one wanted to lose him from the force.

They had avoided talking to me because they just didn't know what to say. I promised to get Rick to the doctor.

I arranged a pulmonary function test. The pulmonologist was stunned to learn that Rick's lung capacity had diminished 37 percent in two years. Although he appeared healthy, Rick could lift no more than 10 pounds and walk no faster than 1 mile per hour. Talking rendered him short of breath. But Rick wanted so desperately to be well that he had convinced himself and his doctors that he was, and his friends on the police force tried to cover for him.

The pulmonologist ordered Rick removed from the force immediately concluding that he was permanently disabled and probably had been for some time. Rick was devastated, but there was no arguing with the tests or the doctor. He left the force just a few weeks before his case went to trial.

The jury rendered a fair verdict for Rick and his family. After two unsuccessful defense appeals, Rick invested in higher education, became a minister like his dad, and was named chaplain of the Cedar Rapids Police Department.

Rick Gail needed me to do what no one else could do for him: He needed me to put the pieces together, discover his true condition, and tell him he could no longer be a police officer.

Life held other promises for this good man. His natural optimism led him to a new and satisfying career. He still wishes he were a cop, but he has enriched the lives of thousands of people as a charismatic minister who leads his flock by example. His congregation includes Ronald Clark, the driver of the truck that injured him.

ROXANNE BARTON CONLIN, a former ATLA president, practices law in Des Moines.

Not alone

Martin K. Brigham

After completing her late-night shift at the hospital, her morning chores, and homework for a nursing program, Anna had lunch with her two children and then went to her living room to sit for a few moments. Finally, she thought, a rare chance to put her feet up on a Sunday afternoon. Minutes later, she heard a crash in the kitchen, followed by the screams of her five-year-old son, Paul.

He came running out of the kitchen, tears streaming down his anguished face as he tried to rip off his soaked pants. Anna's 12-year-old daughter, Alice, followed close behind, pleading for her mother's forgiveness for not watching her brother more carefully.

As Anna flew to Paul, she glanced into the kitchen and saw that the stove had tipped over. A pot of hot water that had been left on the back burner after lunch was overturned on the floor: She rushed her son into the shower and doused him with cold water until paramedics arrived to take him to a hospital's burn unit. There, Paul began the long and painful process of medical treatment for third-degree burns to his groin and upper thighs, enduring excruciating pain as hospital staff debrided--vigorously scrubbed and scraped the burned area.

At the hospital, Anna's daughter told her what had happened. While Alice was getting a drink out of the refrigerator, Paul opened the stove's oven door and stepped up Ohm it to see if there were any more boiled hot dogs in the pot. Seconds later, the stove tipped forward and over, causing the pot on the burner to slide off and dump its scalding contents onto Paul's lap.

The entire incident spanned only a few seconds, but its effects on Anna and her family were devastating and long-lasting. In addition to intense physical pain, Paul suffered lingering emotional and psychological injury. Anna and her daughter were overwhelmed with anxiety over Paul's condition and felt guilty, believing that they somehow should have been able to prevent his injuries.

Anna also worried about how she was going to pay for Paul's medical care and how she could keep her job while she devoted herself to helping Paul and her family recover. She felt alone, never imagining that others might have suffered similar ordeals, and she wondered whether she or her children had done something to bring on this awful fate.

While staying with Paul in the burn unit, Anna spoke with another family about her concerns about how she was going to pay Paul's mounting medical bills. Having heard of my firm's work on behalf of burn survivors, the family referred Anna to us. When we heard her story, we asked if we could go to her apartment and look at the stove. We wanted to understand why it had tipped over, especially given that Paul weighed only about a third of the stove's weight. I called the stove manufacturer to report the accident, and the risk/loss manager blurted out, "Oh no, not again!"

A review of medical literature and Consumer Product Safety Commission data revealed that hundreds of families in the United States have suffered the tragedy of a child being burned, crushed, or killed by a stove that tipped oven The paramedic who responded to Anna's call said that Paul was the seventh stove tip-over victim that he personally had treated in three years.

In 1991, after resisting for years the implementation of any safety measures, appliance manufacturers started to include an "anti-tip bracket" with every stove. This small, slotted piece of metal is screwed into the floor at the back of the stove. One of the stove's rear legs slides into the slot, anchoring it.

The anti-tip bracket was not the most effective way to prevent stove tip-overs--a stove redesign would have been better But by choosing that safety measure, manufacturers hoped that they could transfer blame and liability for tip-over accidents to installers who--like the people who had installed Anna's stove--either failed to put the brackets in place or did so incorrectly.

When we showed Alma the warning placard on the back of the stove, she was at first relieved; what had happened to Paul was not her fault. Then she became angry. Why had her landlord's maintenance crew ignored the warning when they installed the stove just three months before the accident? And why hadn't the manufacturer placed the warning on the front of the stove where she could see it? There were no acceptable answers to these questions.

My partner and I filed suit against the manufacturer and the landlord on behalf of Paul, Anna, and Alice, each a victim of the defendants' negligence. Paul and Alice regularly came into our office, and my daughter took them to the local children's museums as we met with Anna. On weekends, I would sometimes take the children to see a ball game.

We arranged counseling for Alice. We explained to her that other children had been hurt in the same way that Paul had, and that his accident was not her fault. We helped enroll Paul in a summer camp for young burn-injury survivors who we knew wouldn't make fun of his scars by calling him "alligator legs," as others had.

We put together a settlement brochure that included videotaped segments of Paul's excruciatingly painful therapy, as well as admissions we elicited from the manufacturer's employees during depositions about how long they had ignored stove tip-over accidents and how they were aware that landlords rarely installed the anti-tip brackets. The defendants' cavalier attitude toward so many horrific accidents persuaded the court to let us seek punitive damages.

The case settled long before trial, providing the financial resources that the family desperately needed immediately and for the long term.

It is rewarding to know that our work has helped bring positive change in the lives of Anna and her children. Anna no longer worries about how to pay Paul's medical bills, and she and the children have moved from their small apartment in a high-crime neighborhood to a new home with a large, grassy yard on a safe, tree-lined street.

Anna is especially pleased to know she has helped prevent other tip-over accidents from happening. As part of the settlement, the manufacturer added a warning to the front of its stoves, and the landlord anchored all the stoves in all its buildings. Anna and I continue to speak out about her case, lobbying government agencies to enforce the manufacturers' and installers' duty to take action to prevent tip-over injuries.

Although much in the family's life has changed, I am also pleased that some things--especially with regard to the children--have remained the same. At Anna's request, we never told the children they were part of a lawsuit. They now have trust funds and annuities supervised by corporate fiduciaries, but they do not know about them and will not until they are adults. The children still do chores to earn their modest weekly allowances. And I still take them out to ball games.

MARTIN K. BRIGHAM practices law with Raynes McCarty in Philadelphia. The names of the people in this article have been changed to protect the privacy of those involved.

A quiet call to action

Kevin G. Burke

John was alone the first time I met him. Sitting across the table from me, he looked lost, without hope or support. As he spoke, his voice was just above a whisper. Although he was a large man, he seemed small, almost rolled up in the chair. He had a polite manner and insisted on calling me Mr. Burke, despite our similar ages and my protests. He was alone, he had HIV, and he needed my help.

Over the next hour, I learned that John was an anesthesia technician at a suburban Chicago community hospital. He assisted anesthesiologists, physicians, and nurses working in the operating room and the pre-op area. He retrieved anesthesia and other medical supplies used to prepare patients for surgery, maintained the equipment, and cleaned up after procedures. He discarded contaminated needle products and "sharps" (long devices used to penetrate the patient's skin).

In February 1992, a patient who abused drugs and had AIDS was being prepared for surgery. The patient had poor veins and fought the anesthesiologist and nurses who were trying to insert an intravenous (IV) line. After going through several sets of catheters and syringes, they eventually were able to insert the IV, and John collected the contaminated needles and sharps for disposal in a wall-mounted waste unit.

When John flipped up the unit's semi-opaque plastic lid and placed a discarded sharp in the box, he felt a sting between his right thumb and forefinger. When he looked closely, he saw a catheter needle protruding from the box. He knew instantly that he had been stuck by a needle used to draw blood from the AIDS patient.

He reported the needlestick injury immediately. An infectious disease physician examined him that day and took blood samples. The blood test showed no evidence of HIV and established that John was HIV-free before the injury occurred. The physician prescribed prophylactic medications and serial blood tests. Two months later, John's blood tested positive for HIV.

This was the start of his many problems. John's coworkers were aware of his injury and HIV status, so he moved to a different hospital. When his new supervisor noticed his worsening HIV status on the basis of deteriorating white blood cell counts, he changed John's duties so that patients would not be exposed to his disease.

Now, John's life revolved around his HIV status. He began endless rounds of medications, doctor's appointments, and tests. Within the first year, his results showed a progression from HIV infection to AIDS.

John needed help and wanted to protect others. He was concerned first about losing his job, obtaining workers' compensation benefits and health insurance coverage, and providing for himself. Second, he was concerned about his fiancee; they agreed to end their engagement because of his disease. I believe John was the catalyst for that decision. Finally, he was concerned that other health care workers would suffer needle-stick injuries. He knew legal action would be necessary to compel manufacturers to improve their products' safety.

That's why John came to me. Our first goal was to identify the manufacturers of the catheter needle and the sharps box. Fortunately, John knew that Baxter Health Care Corp. designed and manufactured the box, and he knew its model number. Although he did not retrieve the contaminated needle, he was certain of the type that caused his injury.

Together, we went to a hospital supply room and examined various catheter sets. He easily identified the needle that injured him as an Angiocath IV catheter manufactured by Becton-Dickinson Vascular Access, Inc.

A catheter is a thin, hollow tube made of flexible material that is inserted into a patient's vein to administer fluids or medication. The device includes an "introducer" needle that extends through the hollow passageway of the catheter. It is extremely sharp so that it easily punctures the skin and provides smooth access to veins. The catheter and introducer needle are inserted as a unit; the needle is then withdrawn and the catheter left in place. Used catheter needles are usually discarded in a sharps-disposal container.

To build John's case that the needle-stick injury caused him to contract HIV, I secured experts in epidemiology, medical device safety, and mechanical engineering to testify against Baxter. An engineer who had designed a safer catheter for use in hospitals agreed to testify against Becton-Dickinson.

That expert had designed a catheter that included a shield to cover the exposed needle after it is withdrawn from the patient's blood vessel. In fact, our expert had offered to license his patent for this device to Becton-Dickinson in 1987. When the company failed to take advantage of this opportunity, he licensed his patent to Johnson & Johnson, which began selling a product called Protect-IV in 1988.

Our expert in mechanical engineering criticized the Baxter disposal unit's design because it allowed discarded needles to protrude from the box and lacked a barrier that would protect health care workers from needlesticks. He identified numerous other units on the market designed to prevent such contact.

As discovery proceeded, I worried about John's deposition. I was concerned that the defense lawyers' questions would focus on other risk factors to explain his HIV status. In my opinion, he had suffered enough. I prepared John carefully for this line of attack.

My fears, however, were unjustified. John bad answered all these questions repeatedly for his many physicians. He was neither uncomfortable nor embarrassed. Also, the defense attorneys recognized that the negative results of the blood test done on the day of the injury meant it was unlikely that John had contracted the disease from any other source. His deposition went smoothly.

Soon, John's health began to deteriorate, and he was diagnosed with metastatic colon cancer. His treating physicians insisted that the underlying HIV had not caused the cancer, but I have always doubted that it was a coincidence.

John wanted to obtain a settlement as soon as possible so he could enjoy the time he had left. After several pretrial conferences, we settled his case. John now had sufficient resources to enjoy the rest of his life.

Becton-Dickinson filed a motion to keep the terms of the settlement confidential. We opposed any attempt to hide this case from the public. After argument, the trial court agreed with us and refused to enter an order to make the settlement terms confidential or to seal the records filed with the court during the case. John's wish to tell his story and help others came true.

John died in late 1996, 18 months after his settlement. He had spent most of that time traveling throughout the United States. He sent me postcards, and we talked occasionally on the phone. Unfortunately, when he died, he was alone again.

Since John's death, the federal government has taken significant steps to prevent needlestick injuries. In 2000, President Bill Clinton signed the Needlestick Safety and Prevention Act, in which Congress stated that safer medical devices--such as needleless systems and devices with sharp-injury protection-must be used to shield health care workers from exposure to blood-borne pathogens as a result of needlesticks. Congress noted that, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, these devices decrease needle stick injuries by 62 percent to 88 percent.

This law directed the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to change its existing blood-borne pathogen standards. OSHA's revised standards specifically require that engineering and work-practice controls be used to eliminate or minimize employee exposure to needlestick injuries.

John's story is a quiet one. He did not seek attention. He was one of countless health care workers who have sustained disabling injuries or died after being stuck by a contaminated needle. John's case was one pebble in an avalanche of information that led Congress to act. His pursuit of a tort remedy kept this issue before the government, manufacturers, and the public.

KEVIN G. BURKE is a partner with Burke, Mahoney & Wise in Chicago.

An ordinary day, interrupted

Daniel J. Christensen

On December 1, 1998, Norma dropped her son Leo and his brother and sisters off at school as she usually did. And, as usual, little six-year-old Leo got out of the car and sprinted up to the building, excited to see his friends. Norma, Leo, and his siblings had no idea that in just a few hours, their lives would be changed forever, in an instant. In just a few hours, Leo would never run again.

When school let out, Leo met his brother and sisters outside and they began to walk home, as they had so often before. Norma, a single room, was working and unable to pick them up, so the kids walked about six blocks and stayed with a friend until Norma got off work. Leo's 10-year-old sister, Samantha, was in charge of making sure all the kids got home.

On this day, Leo and the others were walking home with a group of kids from their neighborhood. They took their usual route, which required them to cross Smith Street, a busy road with two lanes of traffic in each direction and a middle turn lane. The children pushed the button on the traffic signal at the intersection as they had been taught to do and waited for the signal to change, allowing them to cross.

The children knew this routine well. What they did not know was that one of the drivers on Smith Street was traveling on the road for the first time. That driver, Sam Hanson, did not know he was near a school and did not notice two school-crossing signs.

When the walk signal lit up, the children began to cross. Leo skipped along just a few feet ahead of the rest of the group. He had gone about 50 feet and was about 5 feet from the curb when Hanson's vehicle slammed into Leo's body. Hanson did not see him or any of the other kids crossing the road. There were no screeching tires, no blaring horn, no sound at all except Leo's bones breaking against the front of the vehicle and his skull slamming into the concrete seconds later.

All of this happened only a few feet from Leo's friends and siblings. They watched as Leo was hurled 90 feet down the road, landing on his head. They had no idea what to do, and many of the adults at the scene also seemed confused about how to respond. Hanson, in an apparent state of shock, continued to drive down the road as if he were leaving, then turned around and drove back to the scene. He sat on the hood of his vehicle about 100 feet away, unable to see the damage he had inflicted.

Leo's brother and sisters were not so fortunate. They saw their brother lying on the pavement, struggling to breathe, blood trickling out of his ears.

Leo's broken bones would eventually heal, but his brain injury was permanent and severe. It significantly reduced his control of all his motor skills. In an instant, everything Norma and her family had envisioned for Leo's future was gone. He would never play sports, go to dances, drive a car, or graduate from college. He would probably never date, earn his high school diploma, marry, or have kids.

Leo was able to understand that he was injured and different from other kids. He remembered what he used to be able to do, and--possibly worst of all--he understood that he would never be able to do the things he wanted to do in the future.

Other than the brain injury, Leo was not permanently harmed, and he continued to grow. Although he could not walk, it was not because his legs did not work but because his brain did not know how to make them work. Leo required 24-hour care: He was completely immobile, confined to a wheelchair, and incontinent. Not only did someone have to bathe him, change his diapers, and feed him, but someone also had to continually exercise him to prevent muscle contraction and skin breakdown. As Leo grew, providing this care became more and more difficult.

Norma did the best she could to provide for her family. They never had much money and after the collision had even less. Norma had to leave her job to care for Leo. She also had to get rid of the family vehicle, as she could no longer afford the payments. Finally, the family was evicted and had to move into a second-story apartment that Norma's friend managed. Although the rent was cheap, Norma and the kids had to carry Leo up and down the stairs to get him in and out of the apartment.

When Norma came to our law firm, we all felt horrible for what her family had been through, but we were not at all convinced that we would be able to help her much. The police report indicated that Hanson was driving his own vehicle, and our investigation revealed that he carried minimal insurance coverage. His insurer promptly offered his policy limits and assured us that Hanson was not working at the time of the collision.

Hanson's policy limits would have taken care of just a small portion of Leo's medical expenses, which already amounted to more than $200,000. It looked as though Leo was destined to live his life dependent on public assistance and medical care.

We noticed on the police report that Hanson worked as a salesman. We decided to file suit against him and his employer to make absolutely certain that he was not on the job when he struck Leo. When we received the defendants' written discovery responses, we learned that Hanson was, in fact, working at the time of the accident--contrary to what his insurance carrier had told us--and that his employer carried primary and excess policies totaling $16 million in coverage.

Instead of taking responsibility for Hanson's actions, the insurer representing Hanson's employer fought the claim at every turn. It blamed Leo, it blamed Norma, and it blamed the city for improper signaling. It also fought the damages Leo claimed.

We retained a life-care planner who testified that Leo would need $13.5 million to cover future medical expenses. The defense argued that the expert's estimate was too high and that Norma, who had no medical training, could provide much of Leo's care, including most of his therapy and diagnostic testing.

In the end, the insurer decided to settle the matter. The settlement allowed Norma to buy a special vehicle for transporting Leo, will enable Leo to get the medical care he needs for the rest of his life, and will help pay for his siblings-who received a portion of the proceeds to settle their bystander claims--to go to college.

Helping Leo and his family was a rewarding experience for my law firm. Had Norma not contacted us, she would no doubt have accepted Hanson's policy limits. Even if she had asked whether Hanson was working at the time of the accident, she would probably have accepted the insurance company's misrepresentation that he was not. Without the settlement funds, Norma and her family would still be living without a job, a vehicle, a phone, or a sliver of hope for a better life.

Sometimes I wonder whether the people who support caps on damages and other restrictions on justice ever think about people like Leo. If they knew about his experience, could they honestly say that the pain and anguish he has endured, and will continue to suffer for the next 70 years, is worth no more than $250,000? I imagine their response would be, "Well, that is different."

Yes, it is, and that is the point.

DANIEL J. CHRISTENSEN practices law with Smith & Carlson in Austin, Texas. He can be reached by e-mail at [e-mail]. The names of the people and street in this article have been changed to protect the privacy of those involved.

Justice delayed

Wendy Murphy

Debra Hagen should not have needed me to represent her. When she first contacted me in 2001, she told me she had been raped 16 years earlier by her godfather, James Kelly, when she was in her 20s. Kelly was convicted in 1987 and sentenced to serve 10 years in state prison.

But by the time I met Debra, when the jury's verdict was more than 14 years old, Kelly had yet to spend a single day behind bars.

I told her I would do what I could. Her situation at first seemed simple as legal problems go. Under Massachusetts law, Debra had an explicit statutory right to a "prompt disposition" of her criminal case, as do victims in most states. A 14-year delay was hardly prompt.

But I soon realized that her case presented a complex procedural problem. There are no "victim motion" forms in the back of criminal practice manuals, and there was no lawyer I could call to send me a sample motion that I could adapt to my case. My research revealed that no appellate court had ever addressed the propriety of a victim filing a motion to force a convicted criminal to begin serving a sentence.

Debra had done all the "right" things expected of her as a rape victim: She reported the crime to police right away. She went to the hospital where evidence was obtained and photographs were taken of the bruises on her neck. She cooperated with law enforcement, waited patiently during the grueling pretrial period, and ultimately testified in front of a jury about the horrible details of the crime.

During a family gathering, Kelly had asked Debra to come with him to visit the grave of a relative. He drove her to the cemetery, threatened her with a weapon, and strangled and repeatedly raped her in his car at the grave site.

When Kelly's trial ended in October 1987, the jury took no time convicting him. But when he appeared to become ill in the courtroom, sentencing was put off, and Kelly was admitted to a psychiatric ward at a local hospital. The sentencing hearing finally took place six months later, and the judge gave him 10 years.

Under Massachusetts law at the time, this meant Kelly would probably serve no more than a year behind bars. The judge then put a hold on Kelly's incarceration until his release from the hospital or May 13, 1988, whichever came first. Kelly left the hospital before that date, but the prosecutor never acted to gain custody of him.

Kelly's attorney moved for a new trial and obtained another stay of his sentence. The prosecutor failed to file a response, leaving the case dormant while Kelly remained free.

In 1992, frustrated by the delay in getting Kelly behind bars, Debra sent a letter to the judge. He forwarded it to the prosecutor, who responded by filing an opposition to Kelly's 1988 new-trial motion, four years late. The prosecutor then contacted Debra and encouraged her to agree to allow Kelly's sentence to be reduced to probation. The prosecutor told Debra that this was a good deal because Kelly would probably win his new-trial motion, and Debra could therefore avoid the trauma of testifying again.

Debra refused to go along, and the new-trial motion was denied. Kelly filed an appeal, but the case stagnated for another four years while the appellate court granted 16 continuances that both the prosecutor and Debra's lawyer said were needed to allow time to locate missing transcripts.

Eventually, the case was remanded to the trial court until the transcripts could be found, but nothing happened for four more years. Then, in early 2001, police officers encountered Kelly and realized he had never served his sentence.

Local media picked up the story of the 14-year delay in Kelly's punishment, and the prosecutor--spurred by the negative publicity--quickly moved to revoke the stay of sentence.

He contacted Debra and again urged her to agree to allow Kelly to plead guilty in exchange for probation rather than prison. The prosecutor told Debra to file a victim-impact statement supporting the deal--not only because Kelly would eventually win his appeal, but also because it was only fair given that Kelly was "getting old" and was in poor health.

At this point, Debra came to me. She seemed almost apologetic for calling because so many people in the system had told her over the years that she did not "need" an attorney to represent her in bet criminal case. I told her those people were wrong, and I immediately called the prosecutor.

When the prosecutor learned Debra had her own attorney, he put the case on hold again. He told me that Kelly was scheduled for hip surgery and that it might be many months before he would be well enough to appear in court. A status hearing was set for the end of May 2001.

In the meantime, Debra wrote two victim-impact statements and sent them to the prosecutor. Debra explained that although she tell pressure to agree to the deal to gain closure after more than 14 years--and to protect her husband and child from the burdens of additional delays and the stress--she did not have the power to change Kelly's sentence from prison time to probation. She wrote that she wanted Kelly to serve the sentence he had justly received--nothing more, nothing less. And she wanted some measure of accountability for the 14 years of delay. The prosecutor never filed the impact statements with the court.

At the status bearing in May, I filed a motion to revoke the stay of Kelly's sentence. I cited Debra's right to a prompt disposition and urged the court to take any steps necessary to enforce the sentence immediately.

At the hearing on my motion, the judge questioned whether Debra had standing as a party to file pleadings or address the court. I responded that Debra was not seeking party status, but that she wanted to be heard for the limited purpose of asserting her right to a prompt disposition. I argued that when the legislature grants a right to an identifiable class of people (in this case, crime victims), standing to be heard is axiomatic, and courts have no authority to conclude otherwise.

"The legislature gave my client an explicit right to promptness in the disposition of her criminal case," I said. "As Marbury v. Madison taught us a long time ago, rights come with remedies--which means, at a minimum, Debra has a right to be heard in seeking enforcement of her right."

The judge disagreed, and we appealed. I was interested in developing the law on victim standing in criminal cases, but I also wanted the state's highest court to hear the details of the shenanigans that had been going on in this case for years, especially the claims that Kelly was too infirm to serve his sentence. After all, I knew that criminals much sicker than Kelly had been sent to prison.

Kelly was a good actor, though, which had helped convince some people that it would be inhumane to send him to prison. Now in his 70s, Kelly had arrived at the last hearing in a wheelchair. He was slouched over and drooling. His attorneys argued that their client had justifiably stayed out of prison for 14 years, in part because he had suffered constant, unspecified, serious health problems since his conviction.

The next day, I received information that Kelly was a healthy man. A police detective told me that he had seen and spent time with Kelly on numerous occasions--at courthouses and elsewhere--including as recently as March 2001. At all times, the detective said, Kelly seemed healthy.

The news media remained interested in the story, and a Boston newspaper sent a reporter to stake out Kelly's home. The reporter photographed Kelly weeding his garden, taking out large bags of trash, and even smoking.

The case was now before the Massachusetts Supreme. Judicial Court, which had to decide whether Debra had standing to advance her right to a prompt disposition--a right that had been violated, in part, because of Kelly's false claims of infirmity.

Ruling against Debra would mean endorsing a system where there would be no remedy even for extreme misconduct in cases like Kelly's. But ruling in Debra's favor might mean imposing substantial new burdens on the criminal justice system because every crime victim might decide to bring a private attorney to court.

Before the high court could hear Debra's case, I had to argue it before one justice. If we lost, which was my hope, we could seek review from the full court and not only help Debra but also make law that could help all victims. Debra was proud to know that her case might help others.

I slept little in the days leading up to the hearing, having given birth to a daughter three days before it. As I sat at counsel's table waiting to begin, I was sure I would be unable even to speak coherently, much less argue about the facts and issues in cases dating back to Marbury v. Madison. But I managed to argue forcefully for Debra's right to be heard. The baby--who came to court, tended by a couple of babysitters--stayed quiet except for a perfectly timed squawk when my opponent made a snide and personal remark about me during the argument.

As predicted, the one justice ruled against Debra. He issued a terse decision, stating only that victims have "no cognizable legal interest in the prosecution of another." Given that we had not argued that victims do have this interest, the ruling seemed off-point, which gave us hope that the full court would see things differently.

It did. The appeal resulted in an important victory for Debra and for all crime victims, although the holding is hard to grasp without reading carefully. The majority repeatedly wrote that a crime victim has no standing as a party to pursue individual rights in a criminal proceeding. The court was clearly concerned about unduly burdening criminal courts and used language that soft-pedaled the ruling.

Debra's victory is best explained by looking at the opinion of a concurring justice who wrote separately to express her dismay that the decision undermined the rights of the accused by giving victims status and voice in criminal cases. This justice complained that the majority had dramatically changed the criminal justice system by ruling that Debra had a right to independently address the criminal court judge to seek enforcement of her right to a prompt disposition.

The concurrence was blunt, and the majority was obtuse, but the result was clearly justice for Debra. By injecting her voice into her criminal case, she forced the system to do the right thing. Kelly lost his appeal and was sent to prison, where he died.

Debra proved that crime victims need not sit idly by, voiceless and helpless, when the justice system fails them. They can and should seek legal counsel and take aggressive steps to protect their rights, even when--especially when--they're told they don't "need" a lawyer.

WENDY MURPHY practices law in Boston and teaches at the New England School of Law.