90's

 

 

AND NOW FOR THE FINAL NAIL IN THE COFFIN

 

Remember when I told you that being a trial lawyer was very much like being a gunfighter in the old West? When I first started trying lawsuits in the 1960s the Insurance Industry had the most money, the best lawyers and the best expert witnesses. I was beaten up with some regularity. In the 1970s I acquired some skills and gained some credibility.

 

In the 1980s I began to strike fear in the hearts of the enemy. The Firestone verdict caught their attention but they wrote it off as a lucky break in a mass disaster case.

 

A $17.5 million medical malpractice verdict resonated but again they saw it as against a large hospital defendant. However, in 1990 I tried a bread-and-butter automobile case that caused them to never again want to come out on the street and face me again.

 

In December 1990 I tried an automobile case referred to me by a St. Louis lawyer against one of the best defense lawyers in Kansas City. Joe Sherman, trained by the Deacy firm, past president of DRI who was an awesome opponent. My demand before trial was $14 million and the offer was $4 million.

 

The plaintiff was a 44-year-old female who was brain-damaged. While the jury was out the defendant offered $15 million and the referring lawyer went ballistic when I rejected it. The verdict came in at $45 million, the largest actual damage verdict ever rendered for an individual in the world and may still be to this day.

 

The Kansas City Star December 21, 1990: "Mary Jane McFarland is imprisoned in a wasted body and has been able to do no more than move her eyes and neck since August 3, 1988 said attorney, Lantz Welch. His client feels constant pain that is like opening a window into Hell Welch told jurors in closing statements Thursday. McFarland made some progress with treatment, speaking a few words, but regressed after her family ran out of money and had to place her in a nursing home, Welch told jurors.

Sherman argued that the verdict should be for no more than $3.7 million and that McFarland was in a persistent vegetative state and could not benefit from treatment.

 

I later settled the case for $30,000,000.

 

 

After this verdict I would never again be able to entice an insurance company to go to trial against me. One of my lawyers would prepare a case for trial and I would tell him to demand $5 million and he would tell me I was crazy. The case would get settled for the $5 million and then I would tell the lawyer to reduce the client's attorney's fee by 50% since I did not have to go to trial.

 

N.B. The Inner Circle of Advocates maintained a "Verdict Book" wherein the members reported any verdict obtained in excess of $1 million. After the McFarland verdict, my in-house moneyman, Dave Brentano, reported to me that he had tabulated the top verdicts and mine totaled $135.7 million. The #2 man was Joe Jamail at $91 million [we did not include his business litigation verdict of Pennzoil Vs Texaco], and #3 was Bob Montgomery of Florida.

 

I was pleasantly surprised to find out that I was the World Champ in my chosen profession.

 

When I established the Lantz Welch Educational Center:

 

 

 

I received the following heartwarming letter from a great trial lawyer:

 

Hollis Hanover Letter of 9/25/90

 

I am sorry I was unable to attend the dedication celebration of the Lantz Welch Educational Bar Center that was held on September 15, 1990. I had a previous commitment to an ATLA Board of Governors function.

 

Receipt of the invitation gave me pause to consider your involvement in our profession. I am convinced that the respect accorded to and the dignity displayed by the plaintiffs' bar in our area was single-handedly created by you. I started practice in 1967 at a time when it was popular among defense lawyers to consider the plaintiffs' bar as a seedy lot of financially marginal lawyers who were unable to get a job with a defense firm. That perception has changed one hundred eighty degrees in the intervening years and the change is entirely attributable to you, to the lawyers you have trained and to the lawyers who emulate you.

 

You were the first truly class act in the plaintiffs' bar and over the intervening years you have made a conscious effort to present only the very highest impression of honor, ethics, skill and talent. The stunning results you routinely acquire for your clients have skewed the conceptions of the defense bar so that all clients benefit from you even though they may not have the fortune to be represented by you.

 

I believe it is unlikely that you will ever receive adequate credit for the great debt that is owed you by the public and by the plaintiffs' bar generally. I can tell you that I daily acknowledge that my path is easier because you have broken the way.

 

Thank you for your philanthropy and for your example. Our profession would be poorer without them.

 

Very truly yours,

 

Hollis H. Hanover

 

 

 

MISSOURI HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

RESOLUTION

 

WHEREAS, the members of the Missouri House of Representatives are proud to applaud the achievements of an individual who has long distinguished himself through his conscientious and dedicated service in the legal field: Mr Lantz Welch of Kansas City: and

 

WHEREAS, on April 29, 1994, Lantz Welch will be formally honored as a recipient of the Tenth Annual Litigator Emeritus Award from the Kansas City Metropolitan Bar Association; and

 

WHEREAS, Mr. Welch is being given this award for his enviable record of achievement as a top litigator who has brought in verdicts exceeding one million dollars for thirty-seven clients and whose litigated personal injury awards above one million dollars total 135.7 million, more than any other lawyer in the world; and

 

WHEREAS, a graduate of the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law, Lantz Welch has provided valuable leadership on behalf of his profession as President of the Law Foundation of the School of Law at UMKC, as President of the Kansas City Bar Foundation, as a member of The Inner Circle of Advocates, and as a Fellow in the International Academy of Trial Lawyers; and

 

WHEREAS, Mr. Welch, who specializes in personal injury trial practice, has lectured and done seminar work throughout the country on the subject of "Trial Practice", and

 

WHEREAS, the recipient of the 1987 Alumni Achievement Award from the University of Missouri-Kansas City, Lantz Welch has been listed in The Best Lawyers in America since the book's inception in 1983:

 

Now, therefore, be it resolved that we, the members of the Missouri House of Representatives, Eighty-seventh General Assembly, hereby join unanimously in extending our warmest congratulations and very best wishes for continued success to Lantz Welch as he receives this well-deserved recognition from the Kansas City Metropolitan Bar Association; and

 

Be it further resolved that the Chief Clerk of the Missouri House of Representatives be instructed to prepare a properly inscribed copy of this resolution for Mr. Lantz Welch, as a measure of our esteem for him

 

 

Certified by Bob F. Griffin, Speaker

House Resolution No. 602, adopted

April 28, 1994

 

 

When I accepted this award I told the Missouri House that I thought it was rather amazing that a "C" student, who could not even get admitted to most of today's law schools, could have done so much for so many people.

 

The day following this honor the KCMBA presented me with "The Tenth Annual Litigator Emeritus Award" with the following:

"He has zealously protected client's rights, been courteous to the Courts, fellow lawyers and litigants and has for more than 34 years demonstrated outstanding skills as a litigator."

 

The Kansas City Star Magazine [weekend] ran this in November 1992.

 

Though I had always avoided an in depth interview to the media, I felt that I was probably through trying lawsuits and the only reporter I trusted was Joe Lambe so I agreed:

 

"LANCELOT AND THE LAW"

"He fancies himself a modern-day knight. His courtroom opponents might scoff, but so what? He has a career he believes in, the means to build his own Camelot, and time to chase his dreams."

Lantz Welch: teen-age rebel, college waiter, powerhouse lawyer:
The facts about Lantz Welch: Born: Sept. 25, 1932.

Raised: Spent most of his boyhood near 39th Street and Prospect Avenue in Kansas City. He started working odd jobs when he was 9. Because of a bad attitude and a quick mouth, it took him five years to graduate from high school.

"I got thrown out of so many classes that it created problems," he says.

Education: Welch earned his undergraduate degree at the University of Missouri-Columbia, where he paid his way by working as a waiter and a building contractor.

Never better than a C student, he finished law school at the University of Missouri while working full time as an insurance claims adjuster. That's when he decided to fight insurance companies.

"I was appalled at what we in the insurance industry did to people - it was a totally unfair match. It was like being a bully. Most people had no idea what their bodies and their lives were worth.

Family: Twice divorced with two adult children, he is engaged to Laura Gault. The wedding is to follow the completion of Camelot, a castle Welch is building on an area lake.

Hobbies: Aerobatic flying, scuba diving and underwater photography, bicycling, sailboat racing, wind surfing, fishing, ice boating, downhill skiing, racquetball, table tennis. He's known for buying the best equipment, studying his sports and practicing.

"Everything I get into I approach from the standpoint that I want to be in the upper 10 percent. It's amazing how easy that is if you make up your mind to do it.

Philanthropic interests: In 1985 he created the Lantz Welch Charitable Foundation. It is now about a $3 million fund that donates $250,000 a year to a variety of programs, including those that help the homeless and troubled youths.

"Most of it goes to disenfranchised people who aren't making it on their own, the kind of people I represent in lawsuits. I'm having almost as much fun with that as I have trying lawsuits.

Pet peeve: Competitors who spread false rumors that he's retired.

Self-image: "My self-image is that of a guy who went to work at age 9 and worked hard all his life. Mostly I've outworked everybody I've gone to court against. "

 

I FELT THAT MY CAREER AS A TRIAL ADVOCATE WAS COMPLETE!!!!!!!!

 

At this point I had not lost a case for my last 28 years and it seemed like I would never get out of the starting gate again.

 

N.B. Definition of a WIN: The insurance company is in complete control. If they make an offer of settlement that the client can not refuse there will be no trial. If we get a verdict larger than there last offer, we WIN.

 

However, in the summer 1998 I had the opportunity to start my final trial. I started trial in Liberty, Missouri a venue noted for small verdicts, with the exception of my case against Worlds of Fun 20 years earlier.

 

It was an automobile case wherein the 55-year-old plaintiff suffered fractures of the hip, arm and ribs and her 89 nine-year-old mother was killed.

 

N.B. Wrongful Death verdicts for an unemployed 89 year old woman based on pecuniary losses were miniscule.

 

I spent the entire first day in Voir Dire and most of the second day in Opening Statement. At the end of the second day we settled the cases for $5.2 million.

 

When I told the trial judge we settled he told me that all of the judges had a pot going. That the low number was $150,000 and the high was $550,000. He was certainly surprised when I told him the settlement amount.

 

That was my Last Hurrah!!!!! AND I LOVED IT WHILE IT LASTED!!!!!!!!!!!!