Legal News

At Fen-Phen Trial, Drunkenness Remains a Theme

By Dan Slater

The show resumed Friday in the Fen-Phen lawyer trial, with Melbourne Mills Jr. back in the courtroom. Mills, 77, whose lawyer says he was too drunk to be found culpable in the case, had been taken from the Boone County jail on Wednesday morning and hospitalized after developing swelling in his ankles.

Shirley Cunningham (pictured, left), Mills (center) and William Gallion (right) are on trial in federal court for allegedly bilking their clients out of $65 million of a $200 million settlement over alleged injuries caused by the diet drug Phen-Fen.

But drunkenness remained the theme on Friday when Rebecca Phipps, Mills’ former legal assistant, took the stand on behalf of the feds. (Here’s the report from the Cincinnati Enquirer.) When he was not staggering around the office drunk, Phipps said Mills would have “alcohol tremors.” When asked if Mills was at a key meeting in Lexington, Kentucky, where the alleged fraud was discussed, Phipps said he “was drunk in Versailles” - the city where Mills had his law office. She said he did not sober up until after the Fen-Phen settlement was reached in 2001.

According to the Enquirer, Phipps, who was reportedly paid $1.4 million for her work on the underlying Fen-Phen settlement, testified that Mills thought Cunningham and Gallion had deceived him. The co-defendants told Mills the settlement was for $150 million — in fact, it was for $200 million — to allegedly cheat him out of an equal share of legal fees, she testified.

That resulted in a confrontation at Mills’ birthday party, Phipps said. Mills called Gallion “a thief and liar” while people were singing “Happy Birthday.”

On cross, the defense reportedly attacked Phipps’ credibility, making the point that she’d been given immunity from prosecution in exchange for her testimony, in addition to turning over the documents she was supposed to destroy.

Gallion’s assistant, David Helmers, who testified a couple weeks ago, received a $3 million bonus and a new car for the work he did on the Fen-Phen settlement.

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on June 03, 2008 (boomark / email).