During the early 1990s, the diet drugs fen-phen and Redux achieved
tremendous popularity. The chemical combination was discovered by
chance, marketed with hyperbole, and prescribed to millions. But as the
drugs' developer, pharmaceutical giant American Home Products, cashed in
on the miracle weight-loss pills, medical researchers revealed that the
drugs caused heart valve disease. This scandal was, incredibly, only the
beginning of an unbelievable saga of greed.
In Fat Chance, Rick Christman recounts a story that a judicial
tribunal later described as "a tale worthy of the pen of Charles
Dickens." Bill Gallion, Shirley Cunningham, and Melbourne Mills
contrived to bring a class-action lawsuit against American Home Products
in Covington, Kentucky. Their hired trial consultant, Mark Modlin, had a
bizarre relationship with the presiding judge, Jay Bamberger of
Covington, who was once honored as the Kentucky Bar Association's "Judge
of the Year." Soon after, Stan Chesley, arguably the most successful
trial attorney in the United States, joined the class-action suit.
Ultimately, their efforts were rewarded with $200 million for the 431
plaintiffs, and the four lawyers immediately began to plunder their
clients' money. When the fraud was discovered, two of the attorneys
received long prison sentences and another was acquitted after claiming
an alcoholism defense. All four were permanently banished from the
practice of law and Judge Bamberger was disbarred and disrobed.
Recounting a dramatic affair that bears conspicuous similarities to
opioid-related class-action litigation against the pharmaceutical
industry, Christman offers an engaging, if occasionally horrifying,
account of one of America's most prominent product liability cases and
the settlement's aftermath.
