Brenda Sapino Jeffreys
Texas Lawyer
02-06-2006
In a perfect world, firms could employ private investigators who are as skilled as pseudo-bumbling television police detective Columbo, Dallas lawyer William Brewer III says.
That\’s rarely the case when Brewer contracts with private investigation companies to help with litigation at 35-lawyer Bickel & Brewer, so the firm launched its own investigative unit in January. It\’s staffed by three former agents and a former training instructor with the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
\”It saves the clients money, because it\’s more efficient,\” says Brewer, a partner in the firm. \”The thing that bothers us all too often [with outside investigators] is we are paying rates . . . for investigators that charge like lawyers, but who deliver sporadic quality.\”
Brewer says the firm\’s new in-house investigators will do a better job than outside investigators, because they will work closely with the firm\’s attorneys on litigation and have a better handle on the information that\’s needed.
\”They can help you review the evidence and help in the advocacy,\” Brewer says, noting the firm uses investigators in 90 percent of the civil suits on its docket.
All too often, Brewer says, reports from outside investigation firms prompt him to scratch his head and wonder, \”How is this useful?\”
Bickel & Brewer isn\’t the first Texas firm to have PIs on staff. But Bickel & Brewer, which also employs consultants with degrees in tax, finance and engineering, may be taking the concept to a new level by launching such a large unit of in-house PIs.
\”It\’s been tradition on the plaintiffs side to have one, because they are doing so much investigation on PI cases,\” says Thomas Ajamie, of Ajamie LLP in Houston. \”You can see how a medium- to large-size commercial law firm would benefit. It would make a lot of sense.\”
Investigative work is simply too important for Bickel & Brewer, which handles securities and large commercial suits, to rely upon a spotty network of outside investigators, Brewer says.
Rusty Hardin, of Rusty Hardin & Associates in Houston, is another trial lawyer in Texas convinced that having an investigator in-house at a firm is the way to go.
\”I don\’t understand why more firms don\’t do it,\” says Hardin, whose firm handles civil and criminal work. \”I am constantly shaking my head at the number of large firms that call us for a reference for an investigator.\”
Hardin says Jim Yarbrough, a former Houston Police Department homicide investigator, has worked at his firm for four years. Hardin says Yarbrough is a tremendous asset, particularly for the firm\’s civil work.
Hardin notes that law enforcement officers do a better job at witness interviews than lawyers, and at investigations. It\’s also cheaper for clients, Hardin says.
\”I would much rather have an investigator at $150 an hour interviewing people — and the client would — than being charged $300 or so by a lawyer,\” Hardin says.
Even though his firm has only nine lawyers, Hardin says he is seriously considering employing a second investigator.
Plaintiffs lawyer Mikal Watts says he employs eight investigators at his firm, the 27-lawyer Watts Law Firm in Corpus Christi. It\’s efficient, he says. Watts says he usually employs former Corpus Christi police officers.
The firm does a lot of automotive litigation, and Watts says some of the investigators he employs \”are real specialized in terms of being able to do seat-belt analysis and knowing how to document the scene of an accident.\”
Brewer says he frequently uses investigators to help develop a case outside of the formal discovery process.
\”One way to go in preparing a complex case is to take 100 depositions. Another way to do it is to find out which people may have information [and] who are relevant to the case, and send a seasoned professional to go out and interview them, like Columbo,\” Brewer says.
That informal discovery can be much more efficient than depositions, he says.
Brewer believes the in-house PIs will cost clients 30 percent to 50 percent less than outside investigators. That has been the experience with the other trial consultants who work for the firm, including employees with degrees in economics and engineering, certified public accountants, tax examiners and technology experts.
\”At a firm like ours, these people are worth their weight in gold. We do securities suits, lots of markets investigations,\” he says.
The firm doesn\’t sell any of the consulting services to other lawyers, despite requests, Brewer says.
John Dillon, the head of the investigation team at Bickel & Brewer, says he expects the lawyers at the firm to ask him and his team to conduct witness interviews most often. He says those interviews will be effective, because the investigative unit will work closely with the lawyers on the litigation and learn the \”big picture\” of what the suit is about.
Prior to joining Bickel & Brewer, Dillon was the white-collar crime coordinator for the Dallas Division of the FBI. The other members of the unit are LeeAnn Revell, Bradford Wheeler and George Webb.
Big Bills
But some lawyers aren\’t ready to employ investigators at their firms.
Houston trial lawyer Stephen Susman says the idea has some merit, as long as the firm doesn\’t use the investigation unit as a profit center by taking on work for other lawyers.
Susman, a partner in Susman Godfrey, says he occasionally hires outside investigators, but usually has legal assistants or associates handle gumshoe work. For instance, Susman says, if a lawyer at his firm needs to serve a complaint, a legal assistant at the firm uses the Internet to find addresses. The assistant may also do online research on a corporation the firm is preparing to sue, he says.
Susman says he has hired a private investigator if the work is beyond the abilities of the legal assistant or associate, but he\’s not always pleased with the results.
\”Frequently the bill gets out of hand. It\’s a huge bill. I\’m upset with it,\” he says.
Many Texas lawyers do use retired law enforcement officers for investigation work on an ad hoc basis.
David Finn, a partner in Milner & Finn in Dallas who handles criminal-defense and white-collar crime work, says he hires a retired Texas Department of Public Safety officer when he needs an investigator for a particular case. He says he doesn\’t have need for a full-time investigator on staff.
Finn says there are times when it\’s better to send an outside investigator to a witness interview than a lawyer. One situation is when he fears a witness may change his testimony, and he needs to be able to put the investigator on the witness stand to impeach that witness. Another situation is in a messy divorce, Finn says, when he wants to prevent a witness from making false accusations that he or another lawyer at the firm harassed or threatened the witness.
Finn says cost is the primary drawback to having PIs employed by a firm.
\”I can see some benefits to that, if you have the volume and the workload to keep . . . top-flight investigators busy, and they understand your nuances, how you like things,\” Finn says. \”The only downside would be if one of your employees harasses, threatens or hurts someone. There\’s a liability issue — did you sanction this, condone this?\”
\”Short of that, I see some benefits,\” he adds.
Ajamie, who does securities work, says he has many international clients and hires investigators around the world to assist with discovery, but doesn\’t have one in-house. For instance, Ajamie says, he has a client in Paris who lost a lot of money through a brokerage company in Monte Carlo. Ajamie says he hired an investigator to check out the broker and his financial condition, and to see if others have complaints about the brokerage.
Paul Coggins, a principal in Fish & Richardson in Dallas, says his firm does not employ in-house investigators but he occasionally hires outside investigators for certain cases.
\”If they are not on staff then you sort of pick and choose, you get a little bit more flexibility,\” Coggins says.